LCTC Ships Concept Design in the North Europe- Mediterranean Transport Scenario Focusing on Intact Stability Issues

In late years, the size of RoRo cargo ships has continuously increased, leading to the so-called Large Car Truck Carriers (LCTC). The design of these vessels introduced new challenges that shall be considered during the ship design since the conceptual stage, which has a very strong impact on the technical and economic performances of the vessel during all its life-cycle. In this work, the concept design of an LCTC is presented based on Multi-Attribute Decision Making (MADM). A large set of design alternatives have been generated and compared in order to find out the most promising feasible designs. The proposed approach is based on a Mathematical Design Model (MDM) capable to assess all the main technical and economic characteristics for each design. Among the others, here focus has been done on the ship stability to assure the compliance with statutory rules within the MDM. A new stability metamodel has been developed capable to define the cross curves of stability at the concept design stage. The proposed MADM methodology has been applied to North Europe-Mediterranean transport scenario highlighting the impact of main particulars describing hull geometry on the technical and economic performances of an LCTC ship.