Electric on the water

Kind of along the lines of Eli’s Lighter-Than-Air musings, I wondered the other day about why ships operating as tugs couldn’t be electric. It’s not as if they need to go hundreds of miles. And it turns out the very initial steps are being taken on that, with prototype tug hybrid and an electric ship on the Erie Canal.

This isn’t the grand solution to marine traffic, but imagine at each port one set of tugss took a massive boat 11 miles out, another set took it another 9, and then other ships did the same on the receiving end. That’s four percent fewer emissions from a 1000 mile journey. Not a huge reduction, but might as well take it. It also has some significant environmental justice and urban quality of life benefits by reducing pollution at urban ports where many poor and working-class people live and work.

Some ports have made initial steps to electrify marine transport, requiring cargo ships to turn off their polluting diesel engines when they’re docked, running their onboard machinery through a connection to shore power instead. Some similar steps have also happened at airports where planes are driven to and from gates by efficient land vehicles instead of using aircraft engines. So there’s precedent for piecemeal electrification.

More on the fantasy side, I wonder if there couldn’t be a category of shipping material that absolutely positively does not have to get there overnight, or very fast at all. Maybe drone cargo ships powered by solar, maybe with floating pontoon panels to add some extra oomf, could slowly get the material to wherever it needs to go. Maybe combine that with a SkySail.