40 restaurants, 7 swimming pools, an ice skating rink… The largest ship in the world, Icon of the Seas, makes its first cruise

Amid global environmental awareness, the largest new cruise ship ever built, Icon of the Seas, departed the Port of Miami, Florida, on Saturday for its maiden voyage to the Caribbean.

Icon of the Seas, which replaced Wonder of the Seas as the world’s largest cruise ship, is 365m long, 96m longer than Titanic. It left the Turku shipyard in Finland in June, after just two years of construction.

The 20 decks and 2,805 cabins can accommodate 5,610 passengers and 2,350 crew members. Divided into eight different areas, the building includes forty restaurants, seven swimming pools including a surf wave pool, nine Jacuzzis, a 66° slide, an ice skating rink and a 17 m high waterfall for passengers’ relaxation. post-pandemic recovery, despite very high prices for this type of holiday.

Hoping to silence criticism of the ship’s superlatives and excesses, US-Norwegian Royal Caribbean wanted its Icon of the Seas to be its first ship to run on liquefied natural gas (LNG), a fossil fuel touted by the industry as a cleaner alternative. to heating oil because it reduces CO2 emissions but emits methane, a powerful greenhouse gas that causes harmful effects in the short term.

“This is a step in the wrong direction. We estimate that using LNG as a marine fuel produces more than 120% of the life-cycle greenhouse gas emissions of marine diesel fuel,” Brian Comer, an international council on clean transport (ICCT) think tank, criticized Reuters. Center for Environmental Policy. In terms of its impact on global warming, methane, a gas produced by livestock, is 80 times worse than carbon dioxide over 20 years.

Royal Caribbean says its new ship is 24% more carbon efficient than required by global shipping regulator the International Maritime Organization (IMO). LNG emits fewer greenhouse gases than very low sulfur fuel oil (VLSFO), which powers much of the world’s shipping fleet.

Minimum cost per passenger: 3200 euros.

Currently, about 6% of the 300 cruise ships run on LNG. Of the 54 ships ordered between January 2024 and December 2028, 63% will have that capacity, according to the Cruise Lines International Association.

Icon of the Seas also features a waste-to-energy system and an onboard gray water recycling system.

On her first trip to the Caribbean, Icon of the Seas will visit Basseterre, the capital of St. Kitts and Nevis, before heading to Charlotte Amelie in the US Virgin Islands and then to the private island of Coco Cay in the Bahamas before returning to Miami. The first cruises open to the public will begin on February 10, with a minimum cost per passenger of almost 3,200 euros.