Havila Kystruten wants to deploy four new ships on its mailboat route from Bergen to Kirkenes from 2021. The ships have been designed by the Norwegian Havyard Group , which belongs to the same group as Havila. Initially, the shipyard had planned for the propulsion systems to be based on LNG (liquefied natural gas), but it now looks like they will leverage exclusively fuel cell technology : Havyard intends to equip the vessels with several fuel cell system modules connected in parallel, with a total power of 3.2 MW. The propulsion system has been developed in cooperation with Swedish fuel cell manufacturer PowerCell , which already cooperates with Bosch on the production of fuel cells for the automotive industry.

In the narrow Norwegian fjords, air pollution increases dramatically during the summer months, due to the large number of cruise ships passing through with their heavy oil engines, reaching levels otherwise measured only in major cities. From 2026, the Norwegian government therefore wants to allow only zero-emission ships to enter the fjords.