A kite the size of a football field will provide most of the power for a German heavy freight ship set to launch in December. The Beluga shipping company that owns the 140-metre ‘Beluga’ said it expects the kites to decrease fuel consumption by up to 50 percent in optimal cases as well as a cutback of the emission of greenhouse gases on sea by 10 to 20 percent. Interestingly, the ship will be hauling windmills from Esbjerg, Denmark to Houston, Texas.
The company that makes the kite for the German transport, SkySails, has made kites for large yachts but is targeting commercial ships with new, larger kites. And it has the ambitious goal of equipping 1,500 ships with kites by 2015.
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Noelle dEstries
Noelle d'Estries, an early GO employee who took on the varied roles of Community Manager, green celebrity blogger, and more. She currently runs worstcookever.com GO entered Noelle's life in February 2007 while she was burning tires in her backyard. A phone call from the green gods at GO, burnt out the fires. Now, Noelle happily wears her GO sweatshirt while eating organic veggies and asking for paper, not plastic. A regular at the local farmer's market, Noelle shuns raking leaves and lawn maintenance, while making gourmet foods constantly. When not staring at her computer screen, she spends time with her equally attractive dog, Tessa, cat, Tim and lover Paul. She currently holds all three point records at RIT and could eat avocados and drink wine for the rest of her life.
4 Responses to Football Size Kite Powers German Heavy Freight Ship
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Next, they will discover the sail, and go looking around the world for short little Englishmen to show them how to use sails! Whole Empires were born and sustained on wind power! Denmark uses it to survive! Oil is not the end-all solution, just a passing phase in the way things really are, a temporary convenience, a novelty item, with a beginning and an end! The world will return to a more humane pace with its demise! We await that day with heartfelt anticipation!
unreal. not real. Im a kitesurfer.
i need one on my car, not that it wouldn’t be a complete nuisance, yet i want to be that guy with the kite on my car.
The funny thing is:
Wasn’t the wind the power source for most heavy ship ever since the beginning of Oceanic Navigation?
Where is the innovation? Oh… We’re now using kites
that’s cooler than sails…
However we’re just one step closer to where we should have never left. Diesel engines are ok; nevertheless they should have never been used “instead of” whereas it could have always been the auxiliary power whenever there was no wind available…
BTW; still looking forward to see if it ain’t all a football field sized joke