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Kind of funny that this "clean" ship is being used to transport cars.

• _ph_ 6y ago
  By the time the ship is in service, the cars it transports might be all electric.
  • tpmx 6y ago
    Wild idea: Power the ship with the batteries in the 7000 cars it carries, partially (speed up) or fully. One cable per car to its charging port - power can be transmitted in that direction too. Edit: Quick reality check: About 500 MWh from the batteries. An oil-based ocean crossing of a similar sized vessel uses 280 tons oil, corresponding to about 3 GWh. So, meh. Probably not worth all the hassle - the cabling, recharging the cars after the crossing, dealing with various extra fire risks, etc.
    • _ph_ 6y ago
      That might be an idea, at least for the loaded parts of the travels. Also, for a ship mostly driven by sails, solar-electric propulsion for the rest suddenly becomes more feasible.
    • _ph_ 6y ago
      About your edit: If you mostly sail, you cut the energy requirements from the engines by 90%, according to the article. Suddenly alternative power sources, like the car batteries, become literally 10 times more feasible :). Add to the batteries any internal batteries the ship might carry and solar on the wings, and you can reduce the need for other fuels further, even if you are not able to replace them alltogether.
      • tpmx 6y ago
        The batteries could be used to make it use 0% oil - use the batteries in the ports and in emergencies. Is going from 90% to 100% reduction worth the hassle? Probably not. I was first hoping the batteries could be used to reduce the extra crossing time (12 days vs 7 days for oil) significantly, but I'm guessing it would only reduce it by 0.5-1 day or so.
    • sabujp 6y ago
      i still like this idea, yes you basically need 7000 charge ports, according to this : https://www.google.com/search?&q=how+much+does+an+electric+vehicle+charging+station+cost https://www.google.com/search?&q=how+much+does+an+electric+v... , you can install one for ~500 - $1k, that's an additional $3.5m million on the price tag. Then to install the additional wiring and some method of recharging cars on the boat at port you'd probably need at least half that so an addition 1.75 for a total of probably ~5 - 6 million. Also you wouldn't necessarily have all these batteries on the return voyage unless you were shipping cars back as well. If you cover the boat in solar you would get additional energy.
      • tpmx 6y ago
        Yeah, perhaps it could make sense economically down the road, once it's all BEVs that are being shipped. It's really hard to to that calculation as an outsider though. Maybe this project should work with a BEV company to do a preliminary feasibility study of this. They've probably already thought about this though. Edit: It will also become more feasible with energy density increases in batteries. I hope it's not entirely unrealistic to expect a doubling in the next 20 years.
    • olejorgenb 6y ago
      Ship engines are at most 50% efficient[1]. Still a away to go though. [1] https://www.nuclear-power.net/nuclear-engineering/thermodynamics/thermodynamic-cycles/diesel-cycle-diesel-engine/thermal-efficiency-for-diesel-cycle/ https://www.nuclear-power.net/nuclear-engineering/thermodyna...