Posted on 01/04/2010 8:48:31 PM PST by Vince Ferrer
A record 370,000 TEUs of ship capacity was scrapped in 2009 – an amount equal to the cumulative capacity scrapped over the past decade – says Shipping Gazette quoting figures compiled by Alphaliner, the Paris-based consultancy agency. This is the largest ever recorded level of scrapping of capable container ships largely because the owners struggle to find employment for surplus vessels. According to figures, 200 container ships were sold for scrap in 2009, including the 17-year-old Hyundai Admiral (capacity 4651 TEUs). With this high level of scrapping, the average age of vessels demolished has dropped to 27 years, thus reversing the trend in last five years when even vessels of 30 years were operated.
Thank God. Something which wasn’t “too big to fail”.
No more need for all those ships to bring cheap plastic Chinese crap across the ocean? Wonder what effect this will have on Asian economy in 2010???
Yes, but are not several new container ships due out this year with a capacity of about 15,000 TEU’s? I understand plans
have been made to construct ships with 20,000 TEU’s.
Well, that's not entirely true. Some of these companies ran to the government and got bailouts, but not from the US government. Germany, China, South Korea, and Japan I think all chipped in in 2009.
I'll bet most of the eco-nazis haven't the faintest clue.
I wonder what happens to the engines from those scrapped ships?
Why don’t they use them as convey escorts or decoys in pirate infested waters?
Having emitted this half-thought - this is the real indicator of Global economic health no matter what pundits say - IMHO
There is always a continuous cycle of replacing older ships, plus a general trend of making the ships bigger to increase the economies of scale. What happened this year was not a normal cycle though. In the boom days of 2004-2007, almost any seaworthy container ship was too valuable to scrap because they needed the capacity. There were also a record number of new ships being built.
Then the crash hit in late 2008, and suddenly there was extra capacity already on the water, plus a record number of new ships being built. They delayed taking delivery of as many ships as they could, they parked a lot of ships outside ports, and they filled scrapping yards to capacity to get rid of the older ships.
Well, I tried to find the positive.
Yup.
In addition, watching trucking companies and contract drivers going under gives one the same sense of impending stasis, at best. Or more likely, deflationary implosion.
“
I’ll bet most of the eco-nazis haven’t the faintest clue.
“
They probably think it’s a great thing the Third World gets all this biz.
And ignore the toxic aftereffects. Which of course won’t be dealt with
as well as in the USA, or other developed country.
“
I’ll bet most of the eco-nazis haven’t the faintest clue.
“
They probably think it’s a great thing the Third World gets all this biz.
And ignore the toxic aftereffects. Which of course won’t be dealt with
as well as in the USA, or other developed country.
“Or more likely, deflationary implosion.”
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Deflationary implosion? Hahaha, ain’t gon’ be no sich. Ain’t you heerd da latest from da Wiz uv O? We gon’ be rollin’ in style, drivin’ dem hybrids an’ gittin’ dem free doc visit an’ ain’t nobody gon’ haf tuh werry bout no moagage an’ ain’t nobody gon’ haf to werry bout fillin’ no gas tank nor nuthin lak dat no mo’.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ez24yjqRGLs
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