Global path planning refers to the determination of the geometric path in static and known environment, most often using discrete methods and associated algorithms on the environment model suitable for searching of global path planning solutions. As the basic methods and algorithms of global path planning originate from graph theory, robotics, control theory and automation, their adaptation to the features of classical maritime voyage planning with the use of electronic navigational charts has not been sufficiently researched. The very modest possibilities and complexity of using electronic navigational charts outside the basic navigational environment and the limitations of currently valid standards makes the research and application of modern technological solutions difficult, notably free, and open source. For these challenges in this doctoral thesis, a methodology consisting of several components has been created. The first refers to importing, storing, and modification of electronic navigational chart objects in the object-relational database that can be adapted according to the navigational purpose, navigation area or type of an object. The following component refers to spatial extensions that can be used for environment modelling, limiting, and speeding up of solution search in the navigational area and determination of the global path. In addition, constraints and standard procedures from voyage planning have been applied, which has been very modestly considered in previous research approaches. The last component refers to the use of automatic identification system data, statistical and comparison of path similarities using discrete Fréchet distance. For the application of discrete methods, the area between the ports of Savannah and Charleston in the USA was considered. Static environment was modelled using hexagonal H3 grids defined by the selected predefined resolution. The path was determined using Dijkstra's algorithm and simplified with Ramer, Douglas and Peucker and Visvalingam and Whatt algorithms, further smoothed by B-splines. The characteristics of a particular global path were compared with the paths of actual ships and validated in the navigation simulator, which confirmed the applicability of the methodology in the maritime voyage planning environment. In future research, the improvement of path determination, simplification and smoothing will be considered, with use of larger number of electronic navigational charts with associated objects, along with the application of other navigational data sources.