Underwater Radiated Noise (URN) has come to the forefront of the maritime industry. URN has major effects on marine life, especially marine mammals such as whales and dolphins. URN impacts the ability for marine mammals to communicate and has major impacts on their migratory patterns. This disruption in turn negatively impacts coastal communities which rely on marine mammals for subsistence and local industry. 

This paper highlights the work done by ABS in partnership with Memorial University of Newfoundland and E-Sonar under the Transport Canada (TC) Quiet Vessel Initiative (QVI). This project aims to develop a generalized URN prediction tool/methodology that can be used by the global commercial fleet, filling a major gap in the currently available URN tools. Under the TC QVI project, several advanced numerical modelling techniques, in conjunction with Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), have been utilized to determine the URN generated by the Canadian Coast Guard Icebreaker, the CCGS TERRY FOX. The URN calculated using these numerical models is compared to data measured during a comprehensive URN measurement campaign done using the CCGS TERRY FOX during June 2023.  

Future phases of this project will further refine the numerical models in hopes to develop a generalized tool that can be used by any vessel to quickly and efficiently calculate the URN generated by the vessel and allow the user to determine the key aspects of the hull, machinery, and the vessel’s operation that can be altered to reduce the amount of URN generated by the vessel.