Shipowners Can No Longer Claim Their Old Vessels Are Too Cheap To Fix Up

With a 15-year-old tanker now worth more than a new one, owners have demolished their own favourite argument against retrofitting older ships, according to BAR Technologies CEO John Cooper.

Poten & Partners values a VLCC available for prompt delivery at around $235 million, compared with approximately $130 million for a newbuilding ordered today and due for delivery in 2029. Even a 15-year-old VLCC could command around $140 million, according to the shipbroker.

“The argument against retrofitting older ships has always been that it’s not worth spending money on a vessel near the end of its life,” said Cooper. “Well, the market has just put a $140 million price on a 15-year-old tanker. You can’t value a ship like that and then tell me it’s not worth improving.”

Cooper expects many of those ships, some of which would have been heading for recycling within a few years, to keep trading into the 2030s. Every extra year is another year of fuel bills, and on a deep-sea ship, wind is, he says, “the only propulsion energy that’s free at source”.

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