2008. That year a test well reaching more than 4,400 meters below the surface of the sea indicated the existence of potentially immense oil reserves, previously shielded from seismic probing by a massive layer of salt, that were found to be deeper and more extensive than any reserves Petrobras had yet found. Termed ‘pre-salt’ (or ‘subsalt’) reserves, these new oilfields lay beneath salt layers over 2,000 meters thick along the country’s coastline, and have been estimated to contain tens of billions of barrels of oil. Petrobras’ plans to develop this deeply buried treasure spurred a building boom for semisubmersible MODUs, FPSOs and offshore support vessels that not only continued the revitalization of the country’s old shipyards, but also caused new ones to be built. By 2010, more than 400 vessels were contracted for construction at shipyards around the country, and ABS had strengthened its position as the leading classification society in Brazil. Focusing on Containerships One ship type to benefit considerably from in 2010, the João Cândido was the first in a series of ten 160,000 dwt suezmax tankers built at Brazil’s Atlântico Sul ABS’ technology development in recent years Shipyard for Petrobras’ transport subsidiary, Transpetro. has been the containership. ABS has worked Lines, were constructed to ABS class. Likewise, the revolutionary with shipowners and designers at the leading edge of containership SL-7 series and the world’s first ice-strengthened containerships, technology since the invention of container shipping in 1956, both built by Sea-Land, were realized using advanced engineering when Malcom McLean added a spar deck to an ABS-classed T2 analyses developed by ABS. ABS was also proud to be chosen as the tanker named Ideal X and hauled 58 truck trailers from Newark to classification society for a series of the world’s largest containerships, Houston. beginning with the first vessel to carry more than 4,000 containers, built for US Lines, and continuing through the first ultra-large Every significant advance in containership technology since then containership, A.P. Moller-Maersk’s Emma Maersk and the company’s had been pioneered on an ABS-classed vessel. The world’s first subsequent Triple-E series of even larger 18,000 teu ships. purpose-built containerships, ordered at Bremer Vulkan by Matson
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