Sustainability at Erik Thun Group
At Erik Thun Group, sustainability has always been at the heart of how we operate. Since our founding in 1938, we’ve embraced a resource-conscious mindset—long before environmental responsibility became a global priority. This approach has shaped our corporate culture and continues to guide our decisions today.
Our strategy is built on efficiency: we aim to deliver maximum value to our customers while minimizing resource use. By streamlining our operations and investing in smart solutions, we ensure that our environmental footprint remains as modest as possible—without compromising on quality or performance.
Investing for the future
Being in the shipping industry, we believe we can actually make a difference in the global perspective by being responsible and do our part. Through innovative ship design, we are constantly working to minimise our environmental footprint. Together with our partners and customers, we are committed to combine our daily operations and business projects with a long-term aim to move from fossil fuels to more sustainable alternatives. Right now, we are in the midst of an extensive fleet renewal program.
During 2017-2024, 21 new vessels were delivered for Erik Thun Group, and we have 10 more vessels on order till 2027; with four dry cargo vessels in the Lake Vänern MAX-series and six product tankers in the Resource Efficiency Class left to be delivered. In total, we are making investments of around SEK 5.7 billion to renew our fleet and improve our business.
Upgrading our fleet
Besides ordering new vessels to reduce the environmental footprint and increase the efficiency, we are doing upgrades on our existing fleet by installing fuel meters and optimisation systems. The most considerable update however, will be done on the dry cargo fleet where battery packs will be installed to ease the connection to shore power. This will be beneficial for the reduction of emissions but also safety wise, to keep everything running in case of a blackout and to avoid potential harm to the environment.
By installing these battery packs, we aim to reduce the need to use the engine while in port. Fully electrifying a vessel is however not an option for our trade. For our new series of tankers, the R-class, we will use a new engine (Wärtsilä 25) which is in theory ready to handle all the possible future and alternative fuels, for example methanol, ammonia and hydrogen.
We believe that the decarbonisation process will be focusing on resource efficiency for the coming years since the new E-fuels are not available yet. In order to produce sustainable options that can stand a proper life cycle analysis, a lot more clean electricity is needed.
Meanwhile, we are working intensively to reduce the power demand on the vessels and by equipping them with peak shaving, batteries, fuel meters and optimisation software such as dynamic drive/eco control. We also design the vessels as ready as possible for sustainable alternatives and we will make future investments to make the vessels ready for other fuel options when available.
Global community - Local engagement
The Erik Thun Group is based in the small town of Lidköping with a population around 37,000 residents and has always made a point of remaining there, even as the business has grown. As an employer with a long-term perspective, we want this town to be a good place to live and we support a number of both local and global charities.
