Systematic Literature Review of Real-time Risk Analysis of Autonomous Ships

An increased push towards innovation and testing of autonomous shipping has primarily begun due to the need for cutting operational costs, for increasing safety at sea, for increasing productivity and for reducing carbon-footprint to make shipping more sustainable to meet the greenhouse gas emission targets of IMO (International Maritime Organization); ably supported by the enabling environment by governments and institutions worldwide. The objective of this paper is to establish a body of knowledge for real-time risk analysis and its application to autonomous (unmanned) ships. A three-pronged systematic literature review is conducted focusing on the research topics of real-time risk analysis, autonomous ships and finally real-time risk analysis of autonomous ships. It yields a considerable number of results for the former two with 80 and 55 research studies respectively, whereas a sparse 15 research studies for the latter indicating a recent interest in this topic. The study acts as a guide for future researchers working within real-time risk analysis of autonomous shipping, and for developing real-time risk models for autonomous ships. It is equally applicable to other autonomous marine systems.