If you had bothered to at least skim TFA, this is addressed in the third paragraph:
> The idea is not to turn modern cargo ships back into sailing vessels. Instead, these systems are designed to work alongside conventional engines, using the wind to reduce fuel consumption whenever conditions allow.
News articles to this effect have been popping up occasionally for the past 20 years at least. So the economics don't seem to stack up. At least not yet; but if oil gets a bit dearer...
They really are being built and used commercially. Probably incentives play a part in this, but their numbers are slowly increasing, so it's not totally vaporware (of course we don't need new articles every ~6 month talking about how amazing this technique is) [0]
I've seen a few articles about Norsepower (mentioned in the top article) validating the shipboard measurement equipment meant to confirm how much is actively being saved by their sails. I haven't seen any hard numbers on what the actual savings are, but they've had at least one ship (Chinook Oldendorff) with sails since at least 2024. So hopefully the public will get some concrete numbers on how much is saved.
Given the increasing number of companies that are mentioned as upcoming partners for actual installations, it might be that they've finally been able to convince shippers that wind power is viable for cost savings.
Is that 10% best case or average case? Also, what's the capex on the the sails, and what's the additional opex (training, maintenance)? Not trying to pooh-pooh the idea, but as said, I've seen articles like this regularly for decades, and it hasn't become the norm, so I'd figure there's a reason for that.
The issue is that when conditions do not allow they actively increase fuel consumption through windage, maneuverability loss, air draft increases and extra weight. They also increase costs through increased maintenance needs and crew training and limits on which docks can load and unload them.
We have had hybrid sail/combustion engine cargo ships for 200+ years, today they are reduced to novelty or historical status. We have been experimenting with goofy hi tech rotary sails for more than a century, and no one has really done more than make a few demonstrators for publicity.
I think news publishing has recurring schedule for topics for filler articles, and this is just the regularly scheduled appearance of Flettner rotors.
I saw the headline, and immediately knew what it is. Always the same: headline implying sail power is back, body correcting that it's about minor fuel savings, and that some shipping companies are planning to install rotors on their fleet.
Somewhere in a cube farm that hasn't been updated since the 90s:
"This month's analytics report indicates our college educated white collar employed left leaning traffic to our properties is down over the same month last year"
<puffs vape>
"Don't worry about it, I'm having AI re-write all the green tech articles from 2005-15, it'll be back by November"
"The International Windship Association says more than 100 large merchant ships are now equipped with modern wind propulsion systems, representing more than 5 million deadweight tons of carrying capacity."
It's not much, but it's more than just planned stuff. I do generally agree with your sentiment.
Let me just check the schedule here... ah, yes, it looks like we should be getting "AIRSHIPS - HAS THEIR TIME FINALLY COME" swinging back around here in about 6 weeks. See you all then.
Agree that it's not going to be a binary shift. The tech does look promising for at least rotor sails, but that's an improvement which also demands use of traditional powerplants to drive the rotors ofc. Still worth investigating imo considering the shipping industry is the area of the world that still contributes highest to carbon output and is sort of an "untouchable" industry due to criticality. If cheap enough this could help while we wait for e.g. "greener" fuel or other things to develop. But yeah, to underscore further, not like shipping will look like my sailing yacht any time soon.
Longer term I think we'll also use synthetic liquid hydrocarbon fuels manufactured through the Fischer–Tropsch process. People have proposed bringing back nuclear powered merchant ships but that's a non-starter for cost and security reasons. We can keep the nuclear plants safely on land and use them to make carbon-neutral fuel.
That is insanely inefficient however. It only makes sense for transoceanic air travel, probably supplanted by synthfuel from biomass, but in the long term we will see ships powered by batteries. Far far more efficient.
Batteries are already being used for ferries but they're too large and heavy for transoceanic merchant ships. I doubt that operators will be willing to make more frequent port calls just to recharge.
... at the moment. We might find ourselves with containers full of batteries being exchanged on sea by feeder ships. Doesn't help across the real oceans, but works along coastal routes (which Asia-Europe definitely is).
The more expensive oil is, the faster the transition will have to be done. Simply because at some point, even the trash that freight ships burn will be more expensive than a bunch of battery containers and an electric drivetrain.
Oil will not stay expensive for a long time without some carbon tax. Even if Hormuz will remain closed for years production will rise elsewhere. The main reason production is not increasing significantly right now - investors are not sure that prices will stay at the current level for a long time (3+ years) and expect prices to fall before they’ll get enough to recoup investments. The longer prices will stay around $100 the more will be invested into new oil wells.
> Oil will not stay expensive for a long time without some carbon tax.
Which the EU already does.
> Even if Hormuz will remain closed for years production will rise elsewhere.
There aren't that many places outside of MENA that produce oil in reasonable quantities. European reserves are effectively at capacity, can't really build out any more. The only ones who can expand are the US but they have to ship their oil elsewhere to refine it (and in turn get refined products back), the US is only net self-sufficient but not gross self-sufficient.
Even if the US were to increase shale oil/fracking... it wouldn't help the markets too much.
> There aren't that many places outside of MENA that produce oil in reasonable quantities
AFAIK all these countries can increase production given enough investments:
US
Canada
Guyana
Venezuela (high political risk but with high oil prices the risk will be taken)
Brazil
Whether the US is self sufficient or not is not that important as net production and its dynamics.
> Whether US is self sufficient or not is not that important as net production and its dynamics.
Unfortunately it is. When there is no oil coming to the US any more that US refineries can handle and process into the stuff the US needs... all the reserves and production capacity the US has don't matter. The US cannot process its own oil.
Today? No. A year or so, with the right economic incentive/certainty? Sure.
Most US produced oil is the easiest to refine stuff. It's got some of the highest demand on the global market. Makes sense to sell it.
The stuff we're set up to refine mostly? The hardest stuff to refine. The cheapest shit out there. We can add the most value buying that stuff and refining it. It also gives a lot of "byproducts" which are useful for plastics and other things which help give even more returns per barrel.
It's really not that hard to change a refinery to go from the heavy and sour junk to the light, sweet stuff. You essentially just end up bypassing a lot of equipment that's just no longer needed, with some other changes in processes. It's very expensive and complicated to go the other way, needing lots of new equipment among other things.
If we absolutely needed to, it wouldn't be incredibly challenging to retool to refine US produced oil. It doesn't currently make sense economically for most refiners, so they don't. And even a several month hit, it doesn't make sense to retool. A persistent expected future where we just won't get that heavy sour stuff anymore, sure, they'll retool. The biggest "cost" is they'll have a bunch of expensive machines sitting unused, and a bunch of new pipe to install to bypass it.
> It doesn't currently make sense economically for most refiners, so they don't.
Agreed. And that's where I see the biggest problems. There is no economic incentive for refineries to retool - if there is a supply crunch, they can make much, much more profit with the captive audience that is the utterly car-hooked American population.
The government would have to order refineries to retool, but that is extremely, extremely unlikely to happen in the next two years. After that, maybe.
Side note: you mentioned earlier that it might be possible to extend production in Venezuela... unfortunately, I don't think that's possible. Their infrastructure is horribly outdated and by all accounts more broken than even in somewhat of a working order. And thanks to Iran blasting a lot of MENA refinery equipment, the manufacturers of such equipment are booked out - there's estimates that it may take half a decade to rebuild all what was destroyed. And the demands of Russia are further adding strain on the supplier market.
> if there is a supply crunch, they can make much, much more profit with the captive audience that is the utterly car-hooked American population.
This only holds true until the first big refinery bothers retooling, then you're late to the party and suddenly aren't in place to produce nearly as much as your competitors.
> you mentioned earlier that it might be possible to extend production in Venezuela
I don't recall saying that, at least any time recently. You must be confusing me with someone else.
I do agree with you though. Rebuilding those fields would be incredibly expensive and take a while to produce some of the lowest quality oil out there. Things would be so much nicer if relations never fell apart and the US and Venezuela kept those fields operational.
> I don't recall saying that, at least any time recently. You must be confusing me with someone else.
Indeed, sorry, didn't realize that the username I replied to had changed. My bad.
> This only holds true until the first big refinery bothers retooling, then you're otw to the party and suddenly aren't in place to produce nearly as much as your competitors.
Well... theoretically there would be an agency responsible to follow up on violations of antitrust regulations. Practically it's been toothless before the current Presidency, nowadays it's degenerated into being yet another weapon to wield. Hand the President enough money and he'll not care what you do.
The notion of using cranes to swap heavy battery packs at sea (even near coastlines) is ludicrous. Some of you guys have never spent much time out on the ocean in bad weather and it shows. Plus the coastlines along much of the Asia-Europe route lack suitable deep-water ports, and have serious problems with lack of security and infrastructure.
We're not going "back" to wind, but there are vessels with modern sails already deployed to save a couple of % fuel costs. There were 9 in 2020 and are 64 now, according to Sintef. Of course kinks are still getting ironed out, but it seems likely it will continue to grow.
Klaveness Combination Carriers (KCC) has launched a brand-new vessel that aims to use wind technology that the company believes will not just reduce emissions, but also improve fuel efficiency on its voyages between China and Australia.
Equipped with the first wind-assisted propulsion system in KCC’s fleet and a range of advanced energy efficiency technologies, MV Baltazar was officially launched at Fremantle Port this week
.. According to the company, due to the ship’s trading area, size and advanced energy efficiency measures including suction sails, MV Baltazar has the lowest carbon footprint of any vessel in these trades.
Currently made from crude oil in a CO2 emitting process from a finite fossil fuel resource.
And yes, whilst methanol can be distilled from wood/crops (a more expensive process), this simply cannot scale, especially if humanity wishes to eat...... You do realise a large container ship is 1/4 mile long and carries north of 18,000 TEU containers; that's 9000 lorries worth. They are big.
Wait until the general public learns about the tech behind most of the currently fielded smoke detectors.
Also, this has long-since been obviated with active acoustic/vibration detection in modern rotor drive-trains.
All that said, every registered civilian and military chopper has high duty-cycle manual inspection of rotor blades too. They use both their Mark I eye-balls and ultrasonic transducers.
Being poor has zero correlation with being “lazy”.
Being poor is highly correlated with having little to no access to financial “leverage” so it’s very difficult to earn any sort of non-linear return on capital.
Additionally, the vast majority of your capital is solely the current market price of your individual labor.
> Being poor has zero correlation with being “lazy”.
This doesn't sound right. If that were literally true, and the level of industriousness didn't affect prosperity at all, why would anyone bother to work?
This is a dishonest take predicated on bucketing everyone who isn't rolling in it from investmet income as "poor"
You won't be "live in an inner ring suburb, shop at whole foods, and peddle ivory tower takes on HN" level rich by working. But with a little care in avoiding big money sinks you can have stable access to basically all the necessities plus some, own your own home and eventually retire. See for example most construction industry professions.
Given that I got my first computer at 12, given all the screen time with video games and programming in my youth + my day-job in software I absolutely guarantee I've clocked more hours on a computer than "with my family". I'm OK with that.
Computers have consolidated work, media, and entertainment all within the same "box" and even a good deal of close friend interactions are now mediated "on the screen".
I'm certain early hunter/gatherers would've been equally as shocked seeing factory workers "leave the home" and "constantly meet strangers".
I agree with this take. When I add up all the films and shows I've watched, music I've listened to, books and articles I've read, games I've played, silly projects I've made, and whatnot else, it's hard to come to the conclusion I should have done something completely different for most of that time. I enjoyed myself for quite a lot of that time. I've learned quite a lot.
Sure, I can rot away and do things on the computer that doesn't really bring me joy beyond the Skinner box it can be, but that's at least somewhat on me if I fall into that trap (although we probably don't need to make more Skinner boxes for people to feel trapped by). There's a lot of things I really want to do on the computer, and I don't really see an inherent problem with that.
Yes! Thank you for making this distinction. The problem is that some people's perceptions have not kept up, not that screens are inherently bad. Not all screen time is equal, and everyone chooses how to spend it.
This constant purity testing needs to end already. The thinly veiled politics on HN is getting more absurd by the day.
Yeah. I don’t see weather or theft addressed in this design.
I recall a wheel-mounted rotor system from a few years back that did address theft, tire-wear, and weather, but it suffered from far too little torque and very limited battery life.
It looks like their solution is to make it easy enough to install and remove you take it with you. My thought would be security bolts so the pool of thieves is at least limited to people with the right bolt head. Also it has a big battery built in so
That's a problem people already deal with in a lot of ways mostly by being better locked up than other more stealable bikes. Bikes being stealable isn't exactly a knock against this if you can take it off easily either...
Then maybe society should be improved upon so that a few dollars or a few minutes of "fun" or "street cred" isn't seen as such a boon to their life that people risk jail time for it.
The US tried "tough on crime" approaches, what has it resulted in? 25% of the entire world's prison population and it still has higher crime rates than its peer nations.
Nobody goes to jail for stealing bikes. Here, the cops will take a report but that's it. It doesn't get investigated. There's a very good chance any homeless person with a bike is in posession of a stolen bike but they don't even fish in that barrel.
That's right, people steal bikes because they are inherently evil and want to make baby Jesus cry.
I think it's ok to define "survive" as an addict who needs (<-also loosely defined) a fix.
You don't generally commit serious white collar crime, tax fraud or do crypto grifts to survive. For petty street crime, I don't really see any other motivation.
There are a lot of teenagers stealing bikes and other stuff for fun. It's common, and in many circles very "cool". Doesn't have to be inherent, really.
> Theft is solved by making society better, not worse.
Phew, good to hear. Here I thought it would be a hard and complex problem, with lots of unknown unknowns, difficult political compromises, a generation-spanning efforts and many potential solutions with uncertain outcomes, partially contradicting each other.
Instead, we just have to make society better. So, what's step 1?
Step 1 could be not turning the world into a an Orwellian nightmare and outlawing mass surveillance, from both government and private corporations.
And if you are still worried about theft in the mean time, you could try looking at wage thefts which has a value greater than all other forms of theft combined.
> Step 1 could be not turning the world into a an Orwellian nightmare and outlawing mass surveillance, from both government and private corporations.
That would make society better, I agree, but I don't see how that would lead to a reduction in theft, or crime in general.
> And if you are still worried about theft in the mean time, you could try looking at wage thefts […]
I'm not worried about wage theft, no. I am worried about theft of my personal property, though. And I notice that you haven't proposed any credible path to reducing it, beyond an incredibly generic "make society better", whatever that means and however you want to achieve that.
There's usually a fairly small number of criminals in the population and they have short careers. Otherwise, the whole enterprise of society wouldn't be viable.
So once you take them off the streets for a couple of years, or decades for the more hardened ones, it's fine. It has an added benefit of breaking criminal networks so the future adepts have no place to fence the stolen goods.
"It has an added benefit of breaking criminal networks so the future adepts have no place to fence the stolen goods" is probably the most naive thing I've ever heard.
I also think you have no idea how much it costs per prisoner per year.
I also think you have no idea how much harder it is for someone to get a job, housing, a partner, etc after they have a conviction. Or how much whatever life they had falls apart, which includes partners, friends, family. And guess what happens when you strip away all of someone's social connections? They lose that safety net, and are now dependent upon whatever society as whole provides. And in the US we have people saying "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" non-ironically, not realizing the whole fucking point of that phrase is that recovering from poverty in the US is extremely difficult.
That money is better spent on helping people who are not able to afford basic necessities, because that is why a lot of people commit property crime.
I suggest you actually open up some studies on this subject because you clearly have no idea what you're talking about. Or just open up a chart reflecting the economy over the decades and compare it with property crime rates.
The US has the highest incarceration rate in the world by both headcount and percentage of the population. How's that working for us? We have one of the higher property and violent crime rates among developed nations. Far higher than nations where criminals are imprisoned for rehabilitation, not to punish. Things like giving them a cell that looks like a bedroom, not pen in an animal shelter.
Prisons are full. We have one of the highest incarceration rates in the world. No cops, prosecutors, or judges are interested in putting a bike thief in prison. We've just decided it's an acceptable cost in our society. It's another reason that cycling is not a useable mode of transport in many places: if you don't have a secure/indoor place to put your bike at work or while shopping, it will get stolen. So you either ride bikes that you can afford to lose, which sucks if you have to go any real distance, or you drive.
Police here don’t even care to help if your car is stolen and you have GPS on it. Cameras and jail do nothing to help protect your property if the police refuse to work.
Aside from the fact that there's little to no actual evidence (not funded by flock cherry-picking, and doing a lot of extremely thin correlation/causation nonsense...
No, it's actually solved by providing social safety net programs and managing the economy to have entry level accessible jobs that pay a living wage. People steal because they run out of other options. The cost of flock contracts would be far better spent on food pantries, job counseling, emergency housing...
There is nearly zero correlation between the number of police and the amount of crime.
Cameras don't solve crimes, Flock or otherwise, unless the cops consider the crime serious. It is almost universal that cops don't consider bike theft serious. This is beginning to change in a few cities but not most.
From what I can tell, they are mostly fully occupied with dealing with emergency situations and domestic violence calls. There isn’t the resources allocated to searching for bikes. Especially when there often isn’t much to go off.
Making the search process easier makes locating stolen stuff becomes more of an office job that’s cheaper to do so the math works out better.
They could solve hundreds of stolen bike reports by just visiting the homeless encampments and running the serial numbers of every bike there. They arent interested, or think the optics are bad.
They will still steal your seat, lights, wheel, and any other bit they can get.
Sure you can use all number of locks, security bolts, and stripping the bike down yourself every time you leave it, but it’s sucks. You’d rather public spaces just be safe.
Yes that's the compromise we have had to live with. But some countries like Singapore and China are showing it is actually possible to just solve theft so you don't have to deal with your bike being stolen.
No idea, only played in low sec. There you shoot everyone. So it's kinda "safe" - no surprises, you expect everyone to try to kill you. Maybe except your own militia, and that's not always.
But the rule is good. Can't say I always adhere to it, but used to loose a lot of stuff , and thanks to the rule, many wasn't that expensive.
I learned this. I had what I thought was a pretty good lock, but the chain was cut very clean. The cut was almost perfect flat, so I assume they used a power tool.
UK has ton of cameras, still plenty of thieving. You're solving wrong problem by solution that WILL be used against you the second govt takes wrong(er) turn
I just got a new bike for my son (he's going to secondary school and needs a better bike), and was surprised to see how many kids' bikes came without fenders. What's up with that? Who wants a serious bike without fenders?
Of course most bikes still come with fenders, but that's also a major limitation for this device: you've got to remove your rear fender. Maybe this device acts somewhat as a fender, but the site says you can't use it in heavy rain, exactly when you need that fender the most.
Being cynical I would say it is yet another way to upsell.
Here in Germany if you want to get a cheaper bicycle, other than flea markets, usually they make you mount the pedals yourself, doesn't have fenders, lights might also be missing, depending on the offer.
Oddly in the UK pedals are a legally required to be included with any new bike sold. Well, technically it's pedal reflectors that are required, but they obviously need pedals to mount to.
Are you looking at performance road bikes? Fenders and lights are removed for weight savings, and for pedals there are multiple clip-in systems, you are supposed to install the pedals that match your chosen system.
If, however, they are doing that for commuter bikes...
I guess that’s the reason you don’t understand why bikes are sold without these things. €400 gets you a very, very, very low-end new bike, like just one step above “unsafe to ride”.
You often don’t get pedals on new bikes because you have your favorite pedals that work for you and anything that’s included with the bike goes straight to the bin, because it’s useless trash. You don’t get fenders, because you don’t usually use those on any kind of sporty bike. They’re heavy, they don’t usually work that well, they are often hard to use in bikes with suspension with longer travel or and they can rattle or simply break and fall off if you ride hard. You don’t get lights and reflective elements, because they’re heavy plastic crap that breaks and falls off. If you often ride at night, you probably own some kind of night gear, high powered LEDs, reflective stickers or spokes…
And obviously once that is the norm for “bikes” in general, then why not save a few cents on supermarket bikes.
> €400 gets you a very, very, very low-end new bike, like just one step above “unsafe to ride”
I don’t agree. After my last bike was stolen I decided to buy the cheapest Decathlon had to offer - 240 - for getting around town and there’s nothing unsafe about it. It’s heavy and has cheap components but everything works fine for light city cycling.
You’re probably right, I’d trust a cheap Decathlon bike not to be unsafe. But they’re really exceptional in this regard, most non-Decathlon gear at cheapest-Decathlon prices is trash.
I don't need to be educated on the increasing lack of customer service for anything below 2000 euros, having got my first bicycle in 1984, upgraded to a cycling one in 1986, had plenty of others since then.
And from all places I lived in Europe, only around here this upselling seems to be a thing.
I think it’s just “cheap bikes”. Nobody wants to work on or with cheap bikes. And bikes are getting more and more expensive (quite fast). A solid bike built with brand name components is quickly approaching 2000€.
“Cheap” meaning low-end, not actually cheap for people to buy with their salaries. Bikes are, unfortunately, surprisingly expensive nowadays, and the market isn’t doing great.
I wonder how good the lock has to be, or the break cables and wire frames cutter resistant, for it to be worthy of leaving alone while shopping on the city centre.
I live in the city considered to be one of the best to live in Europe. Bike theft is absolutely an issue here. I'm afraid to imagine what happens in other countries.
Oh this guy again. This guy is a total douche. Not related, he previously tweeting being "inspired by" Martin Shkreli and writing letters to him in prison.
WJW. This entire article is assuming there’s a single measure of “success” in this endeavor and the simulation isn’t remotely anything like mowing an actual lawn.
I’m usually a huge fan of Pudding, but this completely misses the mark.
Turns out, sail-power scales sublinearly and, shocker, the wind isn’t a reliable source of power for the logistics demands of today’s supply chains.
We’re never going back to wind, but we will be de-carbonizing shipping either with ammonia combustion, fuel cells, or both.
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