Power choice Poll

Web-Foot,

Thank you very much for the info. Will start the search next week. Clearing out space in the garage right now. Cars will have to sleep outside for a few years

 

the tri-hull missle

Is it possible to post some pics so we can follow your progress?

 

hehehe I would be to ashamed of the garage in its current shape to post a pic, but I will post a picture of the basie frame as soon as I have it set up.

 

sounds good will watch for it

 

solar power sail boats and more!!!!!!!!

Perhaps some of the little guys can snag some ideas here,

Roughly 14,000 years after the ancient Egyptians began using sails to navigate reed boats along the Nile, an Oceanic transport giant from Sweden is betting that the future of modern-day shipping rests on a return to good old-fashioned wind power.

But with a high-tech twist.

Stockholm-based Wallenius Wilhelmsen, citing rising prices for diesel fuel and stiffer environmental regulations on the high seas, has designed a concept cargo vessel that could theoretically carry 10,000 cars between continents without the need for fossil fuels.

Called the Orcelle — named after an endangered species of dolphin — the vessel would be partly powered by three massive sails constructed of lightweight composite material. Each sail, however, would be lined with photovoltaic panels that would generate electricity when the sun is shining.

Energy would also be captured from ocean waves through a system of 12 fins able to transform the natural movements of the seas into electricity. Excess energy from the wave and solar systems would be stored in batteries for later use, or used to create hydrogen for an electric propulsion system powered by advanced fuel cells.

"When I first saw it I thought it looked like Star Trek Voyager," said Robert Minton-Taylor, a spokesperson for Wallenius Wilhelmsen, which today operates 60 ocean transport vessels, mostly for carrying vehicles for the automotive industry. "But what it really does is take us back to the shipping days of old."

Despite handling an estimated 80 per cent of the world's trade, the shipping industry is often overlooked as a major source of greenhouse gases and pollution. Yet environmental regulation — both national and international — has in recent years forced the industry to do more serious "naval" gazing about its impact on the environment.

In response, innovative companies have turned their attention to this potentially massive market opportunity:

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Montreal-based Pyrogenesis Inc. has built a garbage-destruction system for ships based on plasma torch technology. On-board waste on aircraft carriers, cruise ships and other large vessels are heated to such extreme temperatures most common pollutants are burned away.

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EnSolve Biosystems Inc. of Raleigh, N.C., has developed an on-board system for treating oily bilge water so it can be released in the ocean without risk of fine. Called the PetroLiminator, the system uses "freeze-dried bugs" that literally eat away at the oil.

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Also on the radar are shipping pallets, which consume enormous amounts of wood and are often tossed into landfills after a single use. EcoDuro Inc. of Ann Arbor, Mich., has engineered a new generation of pallet made from corrugated cardboard and recycled paper. It is lighter, 100 per cent recyclable, and resistant to wood-boring foreign insects, meaning it meets tough export sanitation standards.

In many ways, the Orcelle is the ultimate vision of where the shipping industry could be in 20 years, assuming a concerted effort on the part of transport and shipbuilding companies to get there.

Capable of carrying 13,000 tons of cargo, the massive vessel would have eight decks equivalent in area to 14 football fields. It would be 250 metres long, twice the length of the Preussen, the largest clipper ship of a century ago, but would need far fewer crew to operate.

As for speed, at up to 20 knots it would travel only slightly faster than the Preussen but would be capable of carrying 50 per cent more cargo.

Minton-Taylor said the concept ship was designed with a team of seasoned naval architects, environmental experts and industrial designers. The final design was unveiled at the World Expo 2005 in Aichi, Japan, and while the company says there are no hard plans to build such a ship today, it believes it could be accomplished by 2025 with solar, wind, wave and fuel-cell technologies already under development.

"We took the view that in 20 years' time fossil fuels will be in short supply," said Minton-Taylor, adding that an increasing number of shipping and transportation companies are looking at this issue at the boardroom level. "We hope one day it will be developed, and that there will be a shipyard to develop this sort of vessel."

`We took the view that in 20 years' time fossil fuels will be in short supply. We hope one day it will be developed'

Robert Minton-Taylor, for Swedish shipping company Wallenius Wilhelmsen

Peter Bryant, deputy director of the global marine program at WWF International, said it's encouraging to see a major shipping company sparking industry discussion of renewable "clean" technologies, whether out of concern for rising fuel prices or the ethical and regulatory issues surrounding marine protection.

He said the high seas is often a forgotten area of the world's oceans, because nobody owns it and everybody has an opportunity to use it as a common resource.

"We're trying to improve ocean governance globally, and that means working within the United Nations political process to reform laws that will hopefully encourage greater stewardship of the high seas," said Bryant.

The Orcelle, he added, completely does away with the idea of being dependent on diesel for modern-day ocean transport. "It's revolutionary in a lot of ways, but it strikes me that the approach they're taking is based on common sense, and on what materials are available."

Indeed, elements of the Orcelle already exist in working vessels today, on a smaller scale. An Australian company called Solar Sailor Holdings has built a gas-electric hybrid ferry that uses solar energy to help recharge its batteries.

The ferry's eight, individually moveable solar "wings" can turn the sun's rays into electricity but also double as sails, allowing them to harness wind power and reduce the boat's dependence on propane fuel.

The 100-passenger ferry, called the Sydney Solar Sailor, has been quietly operating in Sydney harbour for five years and is profitable, according to the company. It can hit 5 knots just on solar power — enough solar energy, in fact, to power six homes — and with wind assistance the ferry is capable of reaching 8 knots.

Solar Sailor's founder, physician Dr. Robert Dane, was inspired by the evolutionary biology of insects. Apparently early insects developed wings not just for flying, but first as solar collectors to regulate their body heat.

"Ninety per cent of insects fly and the way insects evolved wings originally was as solar collectors and then they used them to fly," Dane told an industry magazine when the ferry was launched. "So boats can evolve wings and use them for solar collectors and use them to sail."

Applying that idea to a ferry design was intriguing enough to attract Robert Hawke, former prime minister of Australia, as company chairman. Both Dane and Hawke have been travelling the world pitching the technology, not just for ferries, but also for much larger cargo ships.

China is reportedly negotiating to get several Solar Sailor ferries in time for the Beijing Olympics. There has also been interest in bringing the green ferries to San Francisco Bay, a tourist zone where boats are under increasing pressure to operate cleanly and quietly. Ditto for high-traffic ports in the Caribbean and other sunny, highly regulated vacation spots.

One project Solar Sailor is hoping to win would involve the construction of solar- and wind-powered tanker vessels that would transport 200 billion litres of water each year from the north of Western Australia to the water-starved city of Perth.

If the firm got the contract, the end product — in terms of size and carrying capacity — would be remarkably close to the vision embodied in Orcelle.

MacMurray Whale, an alternative energy analyst with Sprott Securities in Toronto, said even if wind and solar power are left out of the equation, the shipping and ocean transport industry could benefit significantly from hybrid-electric designs, not unlike technology in the Toyota Prius or hybrid locomotive technology from Vancouver-based Railpower Inc.

He said tugboats, ferries, and even cranes used in shipping-container ports are all candidates for hybrid technology, because their stop-start work cycles allow energy to be recaptured and stored in batteries.

"Container ports, in general, have a lot of intermittent devices with intermittent duty cycles," said Whale.

Bryant at WWF International said any approach that reduces the consumption of dirty fuels is a step in the right direction. "With the cost of oil going up all over the world, I think it's smart thinking."