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You have all done well on the previous quizes so here’s a challenge. What’s featured in the picture above?

UPDATE:

Ignacio-Wenley Palacios correctly identified the photo as marine salvage equipment known as Titan Pullers. The company’s website says:

Titan’s 300-tonne linear hydraulic pullers otherwise known as “Titan Pullers” is shown above. The pullers have been used in a variety of manners including dragging vessels off the beach or onto barges, parbuckling vessels, rolling vessels onto barges or onto breakwaters or to vertically lift sunken vessels. Several examples of relevant “Titan Puller” jobs are provided on the bottom of this page to illustrate the versatility and capacity of these machines and Titan’s ability to successfully apply skill and innovation to accomplish challenging wreck removal jobs.

Here is a photo fo the pullers in action:

Read more about these masters of disasters HERE.

Our friend Jean Pierre de Lutz is building a new boat using green technology and writing about it on his blog. Knowing we are interested in new technology geared toward reducing ship emissions he pointed us to the European Union funded project METHAPU. Here are the details:

After nearly one and a half years of research and development, the EU-funded METHAPU (‘Validation of renewable methanol based auxiliary power systems for commercial vessels’) project is about to start trials on a prototype of a methanol-based solid oxide fuel cell (SOFC) unit. The protoype will be tried and tested for performance and emissions under real-life conditions onboard a car transport vessel involved in international trade.

According to the independent Norwegian organisation Det Norske Veritas (DNV), one of the five project partners, the world’s fleet of ships is the source of two percent of global carbon dioxide emissions, ten percent to 15 percent of nitrous oxides (NOx) and four percent to six percent of sulphur oxides. DNV specialises in risk management in various areas and operates internationally. ‘Fuel cells represent an interesting possible solution to the problem of reducing local and regional emissions,’ the DNV comments in its report on ‘Fuel cells in ships: safety & reliability’. ‘The technology is, however, still fairly unproven.’

This is what the EUR 2 million METHAPU project, to which the EU contributes EUR 1 million, is set to change: The one-year trial will help to assess the maturity of methanol-based technology and its suitability for daily use in the shipping sector.

You can read the full article HERE.

Starting a Wärtsilä 6 L 64… for a truly amazing engine read our post: The Wartsila-Sulzer Super Engine

We are always on the lookout for “green” stories so were pleased when a friend forwarded a link to Skysails, a German based company looking to augment tradition ship propulsion systems with kites.

SkySails tells us:

SkySails is now offering a wind propulsion system based on large towing kites, which, for the first time, meets the requirements of shipping companies.

 

By using the SkySails-System, a ship‘s fuel costs can be reduced by 10- 35% on annual average, depending on wind conditions. Under optimal wind conditions, fuel consumption can temporarily be reduced by up to 50%. Even on a small, 87 metre cargo ship, savings of up to 280,000 euros can be made annually.

They are not the only company trying to harness the power of wind to propel ship, San Francisco base KiteShip.com a maker of kites for sailboats, is also trying expand into the commercial shipping industry.

“KiteShip is also working on marine applications as diverse as towing oil rigs and other large marine structures, diverting icebergs from oil platforms in high latitudes and in autonomous robot towing of relatively safe cargo such as bagged water,liquid fructose and the like.”

Both companies have tested the technology with (according to them) success. gCaptain will be bringing you more on this story in the future, so stay tuned.

Note: We have updated this post in a comprehensive look at Green Ship Propulsion

Here’s a video showing how the system works;

 

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