CLIIN

Each year, the international shipping industry accounts for the combustion of 400 million tons of fuel on the oceans, and the global maritime traffic emits more than a billion tons of CO2 annually. Thus, the environmental impact of the maritime traffic is significant and calls for innovative solutions that can help reduce it.

_{About CLIIN}

^{CLIIN was founded in 2016 on an ambition to develop simple, efficient high-tech solutions to the challenges faced by the shipping industry. Based in Søborg outside Copenhagen, the company employs 17 people.}

One way to reduce fuel consumption and CO2 emissions is to reduce the ships’ water resistance. The resistance caused by algae and other marine growth that attach to the hulls significantly increases the ships’ fuel consumption compared to clean ships.

Based on the latest robot technology, CLIIN is completing its development of a solution that keeps hulls clean. The solution has huge potential for the global shipping industry, as the travelled distance per litre of used fuel is nearly 15 per cent longer for clean ships than for unclean ships. The solution allows the industry to reduce its CO2 emissions by up to ten per cent, equivalent to 100 million tons of CO2 per year, which is three times Denmark’s annual CO2 emissions.

Moreover, maintaining the hulls clean with the new technology can keep divers from manually having to clean the hulls, thus eliminating one of the world’s most unsafe work environments.

More strategic sustainability work

‘This process has changed the way we think about product development and communication’ Thomas Jørgensen, founder and CEO of CLIIN.

What was your motivation for joining SDG Business Booster?

Because of the shipping industry’s significant impact on the environment, it seemed natural for us to focus on creating solutions that are both profitable and sustainable. It is key for shipping companies to always find new ways to minimise costs, and SDG Business Booster was a way to clarify the connection between the commercial business case and our solution’s sustainable impact case.

What have you gained from SDG Business Booster?

The process has provided us with a much better overview of our sustainability activities and increased our awareness of our solution’s impact on the shipping industry’s level of sustainability. Also, it has helped us get started on strategic communication in a sustainability context, and we have connected to several experts, which has been a major win in terms of networking.

SDG Business Booster has forced us to take time out of our otherwise busy schedules to develop a structured plan of how our company needs to strategically work on sustainability.

What would you say to other companies that are looking to explore the business potential of strategically working on the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals to contribute to a sustainable development?

Prepare for the process to change the way you think about your product development and, especially, about your communication. It will make you reconsider the message you send and, particularly, it will make you rethink who might be interested in your company. Furthermore, all these new thoughts and ideas will result in new tasks, and you need to be willing to make an effort to solve these if you want your strategic work on sustainability to pay off.