The future of the U.S. inland waterway system requires investing in both physical infrastructure and adopting new technologies.
Lock modernization and channel expansion are critical, yet they can't fix the coordination gaps that slow operations. And AI-driven tools are only as good as the structured data feeding them, which the industry has historically lacked. Neither approach alone can address the full challenge.
This session examines why physical and digital systems must advance together, where inefficiencies are occurring, and what a connected waterway network looks like in practice.
Attendees will:

New York Harbor is going electric. This session offers a close look at the coordinated, public-private effort now underway to electrify the harbor’s diverse working fleet and supporting infrastructure.
Discussion will focus on vessel electrification strategies, energy storage technologies, shore-side charging, grid interface planning, and operational analyses, with a particular emphasis on developing right-sized solutions for vessels and future-proof infrastructure. Speakers will emphasize how near-term decisions can preserve flexibility, reduce implementation risk, and ensure compatibility with future technologies.
Attendees will:



As of July 2025, every vessel, port facility, and offshore operation in U.S. waters must have a cybersecurity program under the Coast Guard's new Final Rule — and most commercial operators aren't ready.
This session cuts through complicated jargon to provide a practical guide for working maritime operations. Drawing on hard-won lessons from naval cybersecurity, speakers will give commercial operators a clear, practical path to compliance without blowing their budgets or timelines.
Attendees will:

A vessel has run aground on the Lower Mississippi, miles south of New Orleans. Night is falling, a second tow is bearing down in the channel, and calls are coming in from the Coast Guard, the owner, and the underwriter. What do you do, and in what order?
This session doesn't answer that question for you, it puts you in the room where the answer gets made. Working through a realistic Mississippi River grounding scenario in real time, attendees in this participatory session will grapple with the decisions that salvage masters, tug captains, marine surveyors, and response coordinators face in the field.
The session unfolds in structured phases, with complications introduced as the situation evolves — a suspected hull breach, environmental reporting obligations, a second vessel becoming a navigation hazard. Small groups work through each escalation with experienced practitioners before coming back together for a debrief grounded in three foundational principles: safety of life, environmental protection, and salving the vessel.
Attendees will:

Hear from the U.S. Navy's Military Sealift Command. Details and speakers to be added soon.
The electric transition in maritime isn't just about cutting carbon; it's also about cutting costs. With more than 1,000 electric vessels on the water today, the world is wondering: can we go green without paying a premium?
Fleetzero will answer that question in this session, utilizing real-world examples to show how operators can pursue battery-powered propulsion while saving money, with or without government subsidies. Paired alongside the global debut of the longest-range hybrid electric support vessel in the world, this session will prove that the future is electric – and it’s attainable.
Attendees will:

As ship designs grow more complex and dry dock schedules tighten, the physical work of docking and handling vessels is becoming one of the most consequential — and least discussed — frontiers for automation. This panel examines the mechanical systems, control systems, and real-time data driving a new discipline: autonomy in dry docking.
Panelists will share field-tested approaches to automating docking evolutions, managing dry dock loads, and integrating naval architecture with intelligent control systems. They will also discuss how these capabilities can scale across shipyards of every size to meet the readiness demands of the future U.S. fleet.
Attendees will learn:





Most maritime operators are still running their fleets the way they always have: crew credentials tracked in spreadsheets, maintenance logs in binders, and training records scattered across email chains. It worked until it didn't. Vessels got held up because a credential lapsed and nobody caught it. Shoreside staff spent their days re-entering data instead of supporting the fleet. New hires showed up without the right endorsements because no one had a clear picture of what training they needed.
This panel puts those operators on stage to talk about what changed when they made the switch to modern tools for fleet management. They'll speak directly to what the transition looked like from the inside, what was easier than expected, what took longer, and what the ROI looked like once the dust settled.
Attendees will:

Included in America's maritime workforce shortage is a shrinking pool of design and engineering talent that makes timely, affordable naval construction possible. An aging workforce, irregular design workloads, and a thin bench of early- and mid-career naval architects have created a dangerous gap between shipbuilding ambition and executable capability. The competitive landscape has shifted, too. Foreign design entities, backed by national investment in digital engineering and model-based systems, are gaining ground.
This session will examine the need for Congress to approve a dedicated $50 million naval architecture and ship design workforce development program, and the importance of sovereign naval vessel design capabilities to the nation's security and the Navy's long-range shipbuilding plans. It will also spotlight existing workforce development activities aimed at addressing this ongoing challenge.
Attendees will:



Nuclear propulsion for commercial vessels is back in serious conversation. This session takes a close look at one ongoing effort in the space, the Netherlands’ Nuclear Drive program.
The public-private initiative explores the feasibility of nuclear propulsion and onboard power generation for large offshore vessels, with a specific focus on practical engineering boundaries, safety-by-design principles, and realistic use cases. Rather than looking at speculative concepts, this talk addresses where nuclear propulsion could make sense, how small modular reactor (SMR) concepts differ from historic nuclear systems, and offers next steps to deployment.
Attendees will:

This session gives workboat owners, operators, and shipyards a practical look at how modern corrosion prevention and coating performance strategies are changing what's possible for fleet reliability and asset longevity. Organized by the Association for Materials Protection and Performance (AMPP), the panel will draw on real-world case studies and field experience across commercial, industrial, and government fleets, with perspectives from industry experts and coatings manufacturers and corrosion specialists.
The conversation will address how to evaluate risk, select the right protection methods, and integrate corrosion management into broader vessel lifecycle planning — moving from a reactive task to a proactive, value-driven strategy.
Attendees will:

When the White House first issued a temporary waiver of the Jones Act in March, the U.S. maritime industry was quick to respond, raising concerns about the threat it poses to American shipbuilding, mariners, and national security. Now, with a third waiver extension issued in August, questions about its consequences and long-term impact are getting louder.
This session gives operators, shipbuilders, mariners, and industry leaders a direct forum to share their concerns, experiences, and perspectives on what the waiver is doing — and what continued erosion of Jones Act protections could mean for the domestic maritime industrial base.




The American maritime sector is facing a moment of great opportunity. Federal engagement and investment are growing, industry excitement is renewed, and with new work coming down the pipeline, there's great potential for companies across the ecosystem to reap the rewards.
Beginning with keynote remarks from Stephen M. Carmel, Administrator of the Maritime Administration (MARAD), this session will focus on the pathways and next steps for the U.S. to realize this once-in-a-generation opportunity to revitalize its maritime industrial base, expand shipbuilding capacity, fortify defense capabilities, and regain global competitiveness.
Following the keynote, a panel of speakers will then discuss the new initiatives coming out of the Maritime Action Plan and what it means for businesses, explore how shipyards, manufacturers, and the broader supplier base will need to shift to keep up with the growth of new projects, and offer recommendations for companies looking to move into the defense sector.

California has set new emissions requirements for commercial craft operating in state waters — and the ferry now under construction for Catalina Express is one of the first direct responses to them. The 524-passenger, low-emissions catamaran being built by Marine Group Boat Works was made possible through backing from the Port of Los Angeles and the California Air Resources Board, and represents a real-world demonstration of what compliant, next-generation ferry design looks like. This session brings together the shipbuilder and operator to walk through how the vessel came together and what it takes to absorb the Tier 4 requirements while delivering a high-performance ferry.
The conversation will cover the technical and programmatic realities of building to a new regulatory standard — from propulsion choices and emissions systems to design tradeoffs and the role of public funding in making the project viable.
Attendees will:
Most electric vs. diesel cost comparisons measure the price of retrofitting new technology into an old design. This session starts from a different premise: what happens when a vessel is built around distributed electrical architecture from the beginning? When done correctly, this approach produces a vessel that is cheaper to construct and operate than its diesel equivalent.
To prove this finding, speakers will present validated build cost comparisons across four configurations of a 100-ton harbor assist tug: Tier 4 diesel, parallel hybrid, series hybrid, and fully electric. Learn what distributed architecture removes from a vessel, what it adds, and how it changes what's possible at the design phase.
Attendees will:

Offshore lifting and handling systems are evolving fast — driven by deeper waters, complex projects, and the growing role of remote and autonomous technologies.
The industry is moving toward modular, containerized equipment and embracing electrification, automation, and digital controls across cranes, winches, launch-and-recovery systems, and cable and pipe lay equipment. In this session, a panel of industry stakeholders will explore these changes and discuss how to support the next evolution of this offshore sector.
Attendees will:


Washington State Ferries (WSF) is in the middle of one of the most ambitious electrification programs in the country. Over the past year, WSF successfully converted the largest hybrid-electric passenger vessel in the U.S., finalized design on two new hybrid-electric ferries now entering construction, and is preparing to issue an RFP for its first terminal electrification in Seattle, among other accomplishments.
WSF is no longer exploring what electric ferry operations could look like — it is building them.
This session brings together key program partners to report on progress, share lessons learned, and look ahead at the work still to come. The discussion will cover the technical and programmatic realities of moving from a single vessel conversion to fleet-wide implementation, including how to adapt proven technology to the unique demands of Puget Sound, and how to engineer power infrastructure, onboard propulsion, energy storage, and vessel systems as a coordinated whole.
Attendees will:





Collaborative robots (CoBots) are making their way onto shipyard floors, and this session offers a deep dive into what that looks like in practice. A panel of industry leaders will discuss what it realistically takes to implement CoBots, how to navigate weld procedure qualifications, and how shipyards can access government-subsidized training resources.
Speakers will share findings from a two-year implementation project, funded by the National Shipbuilding Research Program (NSRP) and led by the Shipbuilding CoBot Alliance. Framed through a welder's perspective of what the technology delivers in a shipbuilding and repair environment, this session will cover the benefits, challenges, and the path forward from concept to qualified weld procedure.
Attendees will:
Robotics, automation, and other next-generation tools are unlocking new ways to build autonomous and unmanned vessels — but there's no playbook yet. Shipyards are actively learning how to build these vessels quickly, at scale, with new tooling and a retrained workforce.
This panel brings together the builders, shipyard operators, and technology providers doing that work to talk about what it actually takes: financing and planning major infrastructure investments, installing new tooling on the shop floor, and preparing people to run it.
As demand grows for autonomous and unmanned vessels built faster and at greater scale, speakers will share a boots-on-the-ground view of standing up these capabilities inside new and existing yards — and what it really means to build the fleet of the future.
The infrastructure required to bunker hydrogen at scale has kept it out of reach for most commercial marine operators — but onboard generation is changing that calculus. Methanol-to-hydrogen reforming offers a new path by generating hydrogen on demand using a fuel already widely transported and handled across global marine and inland waterway operations.
This session moves past theoretical feasibility to examine what early deployment is revealing, drawing on projects spanning hybrid-electric ferries, workboats, shoreside power applications, and the first commercial sale of a fully integrated methanol reformer and marine fuel-cell solution.
Attendees will:

U.S. shipyards are entering a new investment cycle, and the inland market is at the center of it. Stricter enforcement of Subchapter M has exposed a critical shortage of drydock capacity precisely as demand is rising — and as a significant share of the inland barge and towboat fleet approach inspection deadlines. At the same time, federal defense spending and policy initiatives like the SHIPS Act are directing capital toward larger yards, creating a cascading effect that positions small and midsize inland yards as increasingly attractive targets for private equity and infrastructure investors.
This session examines the forces driving renewed investor interest in shipyards, what that capital influx means for operators and owners navigating growth or ownership decisions, and where the most compelling opportunities and risks are emerging across the inland and coastal markets. The discussion will draw on recent deal activity, including high-profile acquisitions in the inland barge and shipyard sectors, to ground the conversation in current market realities.
Attendees will:

Onboard carbon capture and storage (OCCS) offers something that most decarbonization technologies cannot: the ability to reduce emissions from vessels that are already in the water, without waiting for new fuel infrastructure or next-generation propulsion systems. This session examines how OCCS technology is being deployed today and how it is being designed to scale efficiently into new construction.
The panel brings together multiple perspectives — technology provider, shipyard, infrastructure, and end users — to address the practical realities of implementation. A key focus will be the intersection between onboard systems and landside infrastructure, including how the gap between what happens on the vessel and what happens at port is being managed and what solutions currently exist.
Attendees will:
The American dredging industry is actively navigating a period of significant change and opportunity. Contractors have made historic investments in new vessels and equipment, safety performance has become one of the sector's quiet success stories, and demand for dredging capacity is growing alongside port development and waterway infrastructure needs nationwide. Meanwhile, new initiatives at the federal level are prompting changes to modernize and streamline processes, and the industry is learning to adapt as those shifts unfold.
This session brings together leaders from across the dredging sector for a discussion on fleet modernization, workforce and safety initiatives, market trends, regional perspectives, and the policies shaping the future of waterways infrastructure. From the Gulf Coast to the Pacific Northwest, panelists will share insights into the challenges and opportunities facing an industry that underpins nearly every aspect of American maritime commerce, infrastructure, and development.
Attendees will:

As commercial marine platforms integrate more autonomous technology and complex sensor systems, the vulnerability of the modern workboat is expanding beyond the hull — down to the microchip. Vessel components increasingly come from global supply chains that introduce real risks: counterfeit parts, compromised microelectronics, and vendor networks that are difficult to vet at scale. This session examines how defense-grade supply chain frameworks can be applied by commercial shipbuilders to secure their procurement pipelines and protect the integrity of their builds.
Speakers will discuss the Department of Defense's strategic shift toward commercial-derivative platforms, reliance on commercial-off-the-shelf technology, and a new, urgent mandate for secure, traceable supply chains. Drawing on lessons from rapidly fielding autonomous commercial platforms for defense applications, attendees will learn how manufacturers can build a reliable digital thread across their entire production portfolio, eliminate procurement silos within the shipyard, and get ahead of component obsolescence before it becomes a problem.
Attendees will:

Fresh capital and project approvals are flooding the U.S. LNG sector. New export terminals, expansions at existing facilities, first-of-its-kind floating facilities, and a build-out of LNG bunkering capacity are all advancing at once. The result is a multi-year pipeline of projects that will reshape traffic patterns, berth requirements, and channel demands across the Gulf Coast and beyond.
For the workboat industry, this is a source of opportunity – and the needs are vast: harbor tugs with higher bollard pull and specialized terminal capability, bunkering operations that need dedicated vessels and crews, and years of channel deepening, berth construction, and maintenance dredging. If you operate or build support vessels, the LNG build-out is a demand signal worth following.
This session pairs a market-level view of where LNG capital is flowing with a practical assessment of the operational services and infrastructure work those projects will contract for — bringing together perspectives from across the market.
Attendees will learn:
In the global race to deliver military capability faster than adversaries can counter it, the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program has quietly emerged as one of the most powerful tools in the U.S. arsenal. No longer just a source for seed funding, the SBIR is becoming a strategic acquisition pathway that transforms agile small businesses into a distributed innovation engine. The mission: to rebuild critical segments of the industrial base while delivering capability directly to the warfighter.
This session brings together perspectives from industry execution, federal program leadership, and the Navy's Boats & Combatant Craft Program Office with the technical advisement of the Combatant Craft Division, which is actively using SBIR to accelerate the transition of technologies into fielded systems. Speakers will demonstrate how the program is evolving from a research mechanism into a full deployment pipeline and walk attendees through the complete SBIR lifecycle – from concept to deployment. They will also discuss changes in the 2026 reauthorization, including the introduction of Strategic Breakthrough Awards of up to $30 million, designed to push proven technologies across the valley of death and into production and operational use.
Attendees will:


Hear from the U.S. Navy. Details and speakers to be added soon.
No sessions match your current filters.
The future of the U.S. inland waterway system requires investing in both physical infrastructure and adopting new technologies.
Lock modernization and channel expansion are critical, yet they can't fix the coordination gaps that slow operations. And AI-driven tools are only as good as the structured data feeding them, which the industry has historically lacked. Neither approach alone can address the full challenge.
This session examines why physical and digital systems must advance together, where inefficiencies are occurring, and what a connected waterway network looks like in practice.
Attendees will:

New York Harbor is going electric. This session offers a close look at the coordinated, public-private effort now underway to electrify the harbor’s diverse working fleet and supporting infrastructure.
Discussion will focus on vessel electrification strategies, energy storage technologies, shore-side charging, grid interface planning, and operational analyses, with a particular emphasis on developing right-sized solutions for vessels and future-proof infrastructure. Speakers will emphasize how near-term decisions can preserve flexibility, reduce implementation risk, and ensure compatibility with future technologies.
Attendees will:



As of July 2025, every vessel, port facility, and offshore operation in U.S. waters must have a cybersecurity program under the Coast Guard's new Final Rule — and most commercial operators aren't ready.
This session cuts through complicated jargon to provide a practical guide for working maritime operations. Drawing on hard-won lessons from naval cybersecurity, speakers will give commercial operators a clear, practical path to compliance without blowing their budgets or timelines.
Attendees will:

A vessel has run aground on the Lower Mississippi, miles south of New Orleans. Night is falling, a second tow is bearing down in the channel, and calls are coming in from the Coast Guard, the owner, and the underwriter. What do you do, and in what order?
This session doesn't answer that question for you, it puts you in the room where the answer gets made. Working through a realistic Mississippi River grounding scenario in real time, attendees in this participatory session will grapple with the decisions that salvage masters, tug captains, marine surveyors, and response coordinators face in the field.
The session unfolds in structured phases, with complications introduced as the situation evolves — a suspected hull breach, environmental reporting obligations, a second vessel becoming a navigation hazard. Small groups work through each escalation with experienced practitioners before coming back together for a debrief grounded in three foundational principles: safety of life, environmental protection, and salving the vessel.
Attendees will:

Hear from the U.S. Navy's Military Sealift Command. Details and speakers to be added soon.
The electric transition in maritime isn't just about cutting carbon; it's also about cutting costs. With more than 1,000 electric vessels on the water today, the world is wondering: can we go green without paying a premium?
Fleetzero will answer that question in this session, utilizing real-world examples to show how operators can pursue battery-powered propulsion while saving money, with or without government subsidies. Paired alongside the global debut of the longest-range hybrid electric support vessel in the world, this session will prove that the future is electric – and it’s attainable.
Attendees will:

As ship designs grow more complex and dry dock schedules tighten, the physical work of docking and handling vessels is becoming one of the most consequential — and least discussed — frontiers for automation. This panel examines the mechanical systems, control systems, and real-time data driving a new discipline: autonomy in dry docking.
Panelists will share field-tested approaches to automating docking evolutions, managing dry dock loads, and integrating naval architecture with intelligent control systems. They will also discuss how these capabilities can scale across shipyards of every size to meet the readiness demands of the future U.S. fleet.
Attendees will learn:





Most maritime operators are still running their fleets the way they always have: crew credentials tracked in spreadsheets, maintenance logs in binders, and training records scattered across email chains. It worked until it didn't. Vessels got held up because a credential lapsed and nobody caught it. Shoreside staff spent their days re-entering data instead of supporting the fleet. New hires showed up without the right endorsements because no one had a clear picture of what training they needed.
This panel puts those operators on stage to talk about what changed when they made the switch to modern tools for fleet management. They'll speak directly to what the transition looked like from the inside, what was easier than expected, what took longer, and what the ROI looked like once the dust settled.
Attendees will:

Included in America's maritime workforce shortage is a shrinking pool of design and engineering talent that makes timely, affordable naval construction possible. An aging workforce, irregular design workloads, and a thin bench of early- and mid-career naval architects have created a dangerous gap between shipbuilding ambition and executable capability. The competitive landscape has shifted, too. Foreign design entities, backed by national investment in digital engineering and model-based systems, are gaining ground.
This session will examine the need for Congress to approve a dedicated $50 million naval architecture and ship design workforce development program, and the importance of sovereign naval vessel design capabilities to the nation's security and the Navy's long-range shipbuilding plans. It will also spotlight existing workforce development activities aimed at addressing this ongoing challenge.
Attendees will:



Nuclear propulsion for commercial vessels is back in serious conversation. This session takes a close look at one ongoing effort in the space, the Netherlands’ Nuclear Drive program.
The public-private initiative explores the feasibility of nuclear propulsion and onboard power generation for large offshore vessels, with a specific focus on practical engineering boundaries, safety-by-design principles, and realistic use cases. Rather than looking at speculative concepts, this talk addresses where nuclear propulsion could make sense, how small modular reactor (SMR) concepts differ from historic nuclear systems, and offers next steps to deployment.
Attendees will:

This session gives workboat owners, operators, and shipyards a practical look at how modern corrosion prevention and coating performance strategies are changing what's possible for fleet reliability and asset longevity. Organized by the Association for Materials Protection and Performance (AMPP), the panel will draw on real-world case studies and field experience across commercial, industrial, and government fleets, with perspectives from industry experts and coatings manufacturers and corrosion specialists.
The conversation will address how to evaluate risk, select the right protection methods, and integrate corrosion management into broader vessel lifecycle planning — moving from a reactive task to a proactive, value-driven strategy.
Attendees will:

When the White House first issued a temporary waiver of the Jones Act in March, the U.S. maritime industry was quick to respond, raising concerns about the threat it poses to American shipbuilding, mariners, and national security. Now, with a third waiver extension issued in August, questions about its consequences and long-term impact are getting louder.
This session gives operators, shipbuilders, mariners, and industry leaders a direct forum to share their concerns, experiences, and perspectives on what the waiver is doing — and what continued erosion of Jones Act protections could mean for the domestic maritime industrial base.




No sessions match your current filters.
The American maritime sector is facing a moment of great opportunity. Federal engagement and investment are growing, industry excitement is renewed, and with new work coming down the pipeline, there's great potential for companies across the ecosystem to reap the rewards.
Beginning with keynote remarks from Stephen M. Carmel, Administrator of the Maritime Administration (MARAD), this session will focus on the pathways and next steps for the U.S. to realize this once-in-a-generation opportunity to revitalize its maritime industrial base, expand shipbuilding capacity, fortify defense capabilities, and regain global competitiveness.
Following the keynote, a panel of speakers will then discuss the new initiatives coming out of the Maritime Action Plan and what it means for businesses, explore how shipyards, manufacturers, and the broader supplier base will need to shift to keep up with the growth of new projects, and offer recommendations for companies looking to move into the defense sector.

California has set new emissions requirements for commercial craft operating in state waters — and the ferry now under construction for Catalina Express is one of the first direct responses to them. The 524-passenger, low-emissions catamaran being built by Marine Group Boat Works was made possible through backing from the Port of Los Angeles and the California Air Resources Board, and represents a real-world demonstration of what compliant, next-generation ferry design looks like. This session brings together the shipbuilder and operator to walk through how the vessel came together and what it takes to absorb the Tier 4 requirements while delivering a high-performance ferry.
The conversation will cover the technical and programmatic realities of building to a new regulatory standard — from propulsion choices and emissions systems to design tradeoffs and the role of public funding in making the project viable.
Attendees will:
Most electric vs. diesel cost comparisons measure the price of retrofitting new technology into an old design. This session starts from a different premise: what happens when a vessel is built around distributed electrical architecture from the beginning? When done correctly, this approach produces a vessel that is cheaper to construct and operate than its diesel equivalent.
To prove this finding, speakers will present validated build cost comparisons across four configurations of a 100-ton harbor assist tug: Tier 4 diesel, parallel hybrid, series hybrid, and fully electric. Learn what distributed architecture removes from a vessel, what it adds, and how it changes what's possible at the design phase.
Attendees will:

Offshore lifting and handling systems are evolving fast — driven by deeper waters, complex projects, and the growing role of remote and autonomous technologies.
The industry is moving toward modular, containerized equipment and embracing electrification, automation, and digital controls across cranes, winches, launch-and-recovery systems, and cable and pipe lay equipment. In this session, a panel of industry stakeholders will explore these changes and discuss how to support the next evolution of this offshore sector.
Attendees will:


Washington State Ferries (WSF) is in the middle of one of the most ambitious electrification programs in the country. Over the past year, WSF successfully converted the largest hybrid-electric passenger vessel in the U.S., finalized design on two new hybrid-electric ferries now entering construction, and is preparing to issue an RFP for its first terminal electrification in Seattle, among other accomplishments.
WSF is no longer exploring what electric ferry operations could look like — it is building them.
This session brings together key program partners to report on progress, share lessons learned, and look ahead at the work still to come. The discussion will cover the technical and programmatic realities of moving from a single vessel conversion to fleet-wide implementation, including how to adapt proven technology to the unique demands of Puget Sound, and how to engineer power infrastructure, onboard propulsion, energy storage, and vessel systems as a coordinated whole.
Attendees will:





Collaborative robots (CoBots) are making their way onto shipyard floors, and this session offers a deep dive into what that looks like in practice. A panel of industry leaders will discuss what it realistically takes to implement CoBots, how to navigate weld procedure qualifications, and how shipyards can access government-subsidized training resources.
Speakers will share findings from a two-year implementation project, funded by the National Shipbuilding Research Program (NSRP) and led by the Shipbuilding CoBot Alliance. Framed through a welder's perspective of what the technology delivers in a shipbuilding and repair environment, this session will cover the benefits, challenges, and the path forward from concept to qualified weld procedure.
Attendees will:
Robotics, automation, and other next-generation tools are unlocking new ways to build autonomous and unmanned vessels — but there's no playbook yet. Shipyards are actively learning how to build these vessels quickly, at scale, with new tooling and a retrained workforce.
This panel brings together the builders, shipyard operators, and technology providers doing that work to talk about what it actually takes: financing and planning major infrastructure investments, installing new tooling on the shop floor, and preparing people to run it.
As demand grows for autonomous and unmanned vessels built faster and at greater scale, speakers will share a boots-on-the-ground view of standing up these capabilities inside new and existing yards — and what it really means to build the fleet of the future.
The infrastructure required to bunker hydrogen at scale has kept it out of reach for most commercial marine operators — but onboard generation is changing that calculus. Methanol-to-hydrogen reforming offers a new path by generating hydrogen on demand using a fuel already widely transported and handled across global marine and inland waterway operations.
This session moves past theoretical feasibility to examine what early deployment is revealing, drawing on projects spanning hybrid-electric ferries, workboats, shoreside power applications, and the first commercial sale of a fully integrated methanol reformer and marine fuel-cell solution.
Attendees will:

U.S. shipyards are entering a new investment cycle, and the inland market is at the center of it. Stricter enforcement of Subchapter M has exposed a critical shortage of drydock capacity precisely as demand is rising — and as a significant share of the inland barge and towboat fleet approach inspection deadlines. At the same time, federal defense spending and policy initiatives like the SHIPS Act are directing capital toward larger yards, creating a cascading effect that positions small and midsize inland yards as increasingly attractive targets for private equity and infrastructure investors.
This session examines the forces driving renewed investor interest in shipyards, what that capital influx means for operators and owners navigating growth or ownership decisions, and where the most compelling opportunities and risks are emerging across the inland and coastal markets. The discussion will draw on recent deal activity, including high-profile acquisitions in the inland barge and shipyard sectors, to ground the conversation in current market realities.
Attendees will:

Onboard carbon capture and storage (OCCS) offers something that most decarbonization technologies cannot: the ability to reduce emissions from vessels that are already in the water, without waiting for new fuel infrastructure or next-generation propulsion systems. This session examines how OCCS technology is being deployed today and how it is being designed to scale efficiently into new construction.
The panel brings together multiple perspectives — technology provider, shipyard, infrastructure, and end users — to address the practical realities of implementation. A key focus will be the intersection between onboard systems and landside infrastructure, including how the gap between what happens on the vessel and what happens at port is being managed and what solutions currently exist.
Attendees will:
The American dredging industry is actively navigating a period of significant change and opportunity. Contractors have made historic investments in new vessels and equipment, safety performance has become one of the sector's quiet success stories, and demand for dredging capacity is growing alongside port development and waterway infrastructure needs nationwide. Meanwhile, new initiatives at the federal level are prompting changes to modernize and streamline processes, and the industry is learning to adapt as those shifts unfold.
This session brings together leaders from across the dredging sector for a discussion on fleet modernization, workforce and safety initiatives, market trends, regional perspectives, and the policies shaping the future of waterways infrastructure. From the Gulf Coast to the Pacific Northwest, panelists will share insights into the challenges and opportunities facing an industry that underpins nearly every aspect of American maritime commerce, infrastructure, and development.
Attendees will:

As commercial marine platforms integrate more autonomous technology and complex sensor systems, the vulnerability of the modern workboat is expanding beyond the hull — down to the microchip. Vessel components increasingly come from global supply chains that introduce real risks: counterfeit parts, compromised microelectronics, and vendor networks that are difficult to vet at scale. This session examines how defense-grade supply chain frameworks can be applied by commercial shipbuilders to secure their procurement pipelines and protect the integrity of their builds.
Speakers will discuss the Department of Defense's strategic shift toward commercial-derivative platforms, reliance on commercial-off-the-shelf technology, and a new, urgent mandate for secure, traceable supply chains. Drawing on lessons from rapidly fielding autonomous commercial platforms for defense applications, attendees will learn how manufacturers can build a reliable digital thread across their entire production portfolio, eliminate procurement silos within the shipyard, and get ahead of component obsolescence before it becomes a problem.
Attendees will:

Fresh capital and project approvals are flooding the U.S. LNG sector. New export terminals, expansions at existing facilities, first-of-its-kind floating facilities, and a build-out of LNG bunkering capacity are all advancing at once. The result is a multi-year pipeline of projects that will reshape traffic patterns, berth requirements, and channel demands across the Gulf Coast and beyond.
For the workboat industry, this is a source of opportunity – and the needs are vast: harbor tugs with higher bollard pull and specialized terminal capability, bunkering operations that need dedicated vessels and crews, and years of channel deepening, berth construction, and maintenance dredging. If you operate or build support vessels, the LNG build-out is a demand signal worth following.
This session pairs a market-level view of where LNG capital is flowing with a practical assessment of the operational services and infrastructure work those projects will contract for — bringing together perspectives from across the market.
Attendees will learn:
No sessions match your current filters.
In the global race to deliver military capability faster than adversaries can counter it, the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program has quietly emerged as one of the most powerful tools in the U.S. arsenal. No longer just a source for seed funding, the SBIR is becoming a strategic acquisition pathway that transforms agile small businesses into a distributed innovation engine. The mission: to rebuild critical segments of the industrial base while delivering capability directly to the warfighter.
This session brings together perspectives from industry execution, federal program leadership, and the Navy's Boats & Combatant Craft Program Office with the technical advisement of the Combatant Craft Division, which is actively using SBIR to accelerate the transition of technologies into fielded systems. Speakers will demonstrate how the program is evolving from a research mechanism into a full deployment pipeline and walk attendees through the complete SBIR lifecycle – from concept to deployment. They will also discuss changes in the 2026 reauthorization, including the introduction of Strategic Breakthrough Awards of up to $30 million, designed to push proven technologies across the valley of death and into production and operational use.
Attendees will:


Hear from the U.S. Navy. Details and speakers to be added soon.
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Session dates, content, speakers, and locations are subject to change without notice.