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Better idea ultra high speed megascale nuclear powered cruise ships that never dock. They pull in 1 km from port and use deckside drones to transport tens of th

Better idea ultra high speed megascale nuclear powered cruise ships that never dock. They pull in 1 km from port and use deckside drones to transport tens of thousands of passengers safely on shore in different places all at once or as needed. Speed should reach at least 150mph. And with nuclear power become the domina t coastal form of circuit/belt transport. Not just people but cargo. Nuclear powered merchant marine should have happened. One day it will. Problem with zepllins is the skin will never be robust...because the bigger and faster the zepplins go the thicker the skin must be and the more difficult self healin smart skin systems will be to invent iterate and operate. Forget c02 and global warming. Think about simple economics. Next generation systems must be an order of magnitude more efficient in delivering a passenger to his ultimate goal or to any goal. That doesnt always mean only energy efficiency and operation and fuel price per passenger mile but these are strong factors in the equation.

nradov 7y ago
It's effectively impossible to run a large surface ship at much over 40kts no matter how much power you have. The drag on a displacement hull is too high, and planing hulls and hydrofoils don't really work for anything large.
- ericd 7y ago
  There was a company working on hydrofoils for cargo ships in one of the recent YC batches. No idea how it’s going, but they at least seem to think it’s possible to put foils on something large.
  - symplee 7y ago
    What about cargo torpedoes? I imagine you could fit an airplane load into a very large submarine/torpedo and send it at 200 km/h with a nuclear powered propulsion.
    - weberc2 7y ago
      No idea if this idea is any good or not, but I wouldn’t recommend marketing this solution using the words “nuclear” and “torpedo”.
    - ummonk 7y ago
      The fastest submarine of all time only went 75 km/h...
      - jacobush 7y ago
        So? The idea is batshit insane, but I'm not sure it's against physics. Imagine a supercavity nuclear powered submarine cargo ship. I can't run the calculations for that. It would probably kill/scare all whales left in the ocean, but it might "work".
  - nradov 7y ago
    Boundary Layer Technologies is developing small cargo hydrofoils to compete with air freight. This may be a viable niche market. But their design looks like it has only about 1% of the capacity of the largest displacement hull container ships. Hydrofoil technology doesn't scale. And the cruising speed won't be much over 50kts.
    - alexisread 7y ago
      Agreed! A possible solution in this style are Wing-In-Ground effect aircraft (WIGs) such as the Pelican. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_Pelican https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_Pelican Having said that, hydrogen airships are probably the way to go due to abundant gas, high lift, ability to compress as per airlander. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_Air_Vehicles_HAV_304/Airlander_10 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_Air_Vehicles_HAV_304/...
    - ericd 7y ago
      Ah didn’t realize it was just for very small cargo ships, thanks for the analysis.
    - JeremyPOsborne 7y ago
      Jeremy from BLT. I just saw this post, cool! You are right on that we're developing small cargo ships at about 1% of the largest containers ships. However, a comparison to the largest container vessel is not fair. Our concept has 160 twenty-foot containers (TEU), which is the same as fourteen 747 cargo airplanes and can complete on freight duration with airfreight. Most air freight takes 3-7 days despite a 12 hours in-air transit time, and the remaining time is sitting around airports. We can deliver in 6 days across the pacific ocean, and port wait times are minimal because of our small vessel. Though, if you pay 10x the premium, you can get FedEx or DHL to deliver up to a 1 ton anywhere overnight. Airfreight moves 35% of the world's cargo value and is a $100b market, and a single airplane is only 0.06% capacity of the largest container ship. Hardly niche. If the hydrofoils ships are too large, they will spend too much time filling the vessel rather than delivering point-to-point cargo, improving the service. Most ocean lines make 4-6 stops at ports, while a small foil ship can load quickly and make no stops, thus significantly reducing the door to door duration. Correctly pointed out, hydrofoils do not follow the same scale laws as standard buoyancy vessel. The amount of cargo that can be delivered increases with the cube of the length assuming all else scales, meaning the fuel and crew cost per container decreases drastically with larger ships. That's why we see mega-20,000 TEU-container-ships. Hydrofoil ship lift capability scales linearly with plan area of the foil, so we don't gain much making them mega-ships. Airships are cool. I'd like to see one built.
symplee 7y ago
For the mega nuclear powered cruise ship, you can have a sliding deck that everyone pre-loads onto for fast boarding and exit. Imagine if an entire floor could slide out onto the dock, and the floor above could slide into the ship at the same time. Both floors hold all people exiting and entering the ship.
cardamomo 7y ago
I'd hate to think what the propellor noise would do to whales and other sea life.
- jbay808 7y ago
  If we're already fantasizing about going nuclear, why not also use classified military submarine propulsion systems? That ought to keep the noise down.
- perilunar 7y ago
  Use air propellors, like a hovercraft, and annoy the birds instead.

nradov 7y ago

It's effectively impossible to run a large surface ship at much over 40kts no matter how much power you have. The drag on a displacement hull is too high, and planing hulls and hydrofoils don't really work for anything large.

ericd 7y ago
There was a company working on hydrofoils for cargo ships in one of the recent YC batches. No idea how it’s going, but they at least seem to think it’s possible to put foils on something large.
- symplee 7y ago
  What about cargo torpedoes? I imagine you could fit an airplane load into a very large submarine/torpedo and send it at 200 km/h with a nuclear powered propulsion.
  - weberc2 7y ago
    No idea if this idea is any good or not, but I wouldn’t recommend marketing this solution using the words “nuclear” and “torpedo”.
  - ummonk 7y ago
    The fastest submarine of all time only went 75 km/h...
    - jacobush 7y ago
      So? The idea is batshit insane, but I'm not sure it's against physics. Imagine a supercavity nuclear powered submarine cargo ship. I can't run the calculations for that. It would probably kill/scare all whales left in the ocean, but it might "work".
- nradov 7y ago
  Boundary Layer Technologies is developing small cargo hydrofoils to compete with air freight. This may be a viable niche market. But their design looks like it has only about 1% of the capacity of the largest displacement hull container ships. Hydrofoil technology doesn't scale. And the cruising speed won't be much over 50kts.
  - alexisread 7y ago
    Agreed! A possible solution in this style are Wing-In-Ground effect aircraft (WIGs) such as the Pelican. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_Pelican https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_Pelican Having said that, hydrogen airships are probably the way to go due to abundant gas, high lift, ability to compress as per airlander. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_Air_Vehicles_HAV_304/Airlander_10 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_Air_Vehicles_HAV_304/...
  - ericd 7y ago
    Ah didn’t realize it was just for very small cargo ships, thanks for the analysis.
  - JeremyPOsborne 7y ago
    Jeremy from BLT. I just saw this post, cool! You are right on that we're developing small cargo ships at about 1% of the largest containers ships. However, a comparison to the largest container vessel is not fair. Our concept has 160 twenty-foot containers (TEU), which is the same as fourteen 747 cargo airplanes and can complete on freight duration with airfreight. Most air freight takes 3-7 days despite a 12 hours in-air transit time, and the remaining time is sitting around airports. We can deliver in 6 days across the pacific ocean, and port wait times are minimal because of our small vessel. Though, if you pay 10x the premium, you can get FedEx or DHL to deliver up to a 1 ton anywhere overnight. Airfreight moves 35% of the world's cargo value and is a $100b market, and a single airplane is only 0.06% capacity of the largest container ship. Hardly niche. If the hydrofoils ships are too large, they will spend too much time filling the vessel rather than delivering point-to-point cargo, improving the service. Most ocean lines make 4-6 stops at ports, while a small foil ship can load quickly and make no stops, thus significantly reducing the door to door duration. Correctly pointed out, hydrofoils do not follow the same scale laws as standard buoyancy vessel. The amount of cargo that can be delivered increases with the cube of the length assuming all else scales, meaning the fuel and crew cost per container decreases drastically with larger ships. That's why we see mega-20,000 TEU-container-ships. Hydrofoil ship lift capability scales linearly with plan area of the foil, so we don't gain much making them mega-ships. Airships are cool. I'd like to see one built.

symplee 7y ago

For the mega nuclear powered cruise ship, you can have a sliding deck that everyone pre-loads onto for fast boarding and exit. Imagine if an entire floor could slide out onto the dock, and the floor above could slide into the ship at the same time. Both floors hold all people exiting and entering the ship.

cardamomo 7y ago

I'd hate to think what the propellor noise would do to whales and other sea life.

jbay808 7y ago
If we're already fantasizing about going nuclear, why not also use classified military submarine propulsion systems? That ought to keep the noise down.
perilunar 7y ago
Use air propellors, like a hovercraft, and annoy the birds instead.