ZERO-CARBON DIESEL

A new kind of renewable diesel claims to offer all the performance of a fossil-fuelled boat without the carbon footprint. Is this the holy grail we’ve all been searching for?

If you’ve ever wondered how big the challenge of moving to a low-carbon economy is going to be, consider this sobering statistic: in 2017 we burnt an astonishing 955 billion gallons of oil globally. The number alone is hard to visualize (955,000,000,000), let alone the fuel itself. It’s simply not possible to replace that quantity of fuel with electric power alone in the short to medium term, however good we get at generating and storing it sustainably. The reality is that it’s going to take a combination of different actions and technologies to make a meaningful difference.

On the boating front we’re already seeing exciting innovations such as solar-powered motor cats, electric foilers and fast-displacement hulls doing their bit to cut fuel consumption, even if they usually come at the cost of reduced performance and/or range. But what if you could keep all the attributes of your existing fossil-fuelled boat, including its powerful combustion engines, and still not be adding any CO2 to the atmosphere? That is the vision which American start-up Gevo is trying to sell to everyone from airline operators to leisure boaters. It even held a series of press conferences at the Düsseldorf Boat Show to explain the technology behind it.

WHISKY GALORE