A future for sail?

[macdarawhitfield]

I read a couple of months back the Germans are experimenting with new sail technology to augment the power of diesel engines on cargo vessels.Apparently the sail is more like an enormous parachute or kite which is launched from the ship in the right weather conditions.It is expected to save at least 15% in fuel costs.Will sailing vessels return on a big scale as fossil fuels run down or become very dear?

[Vega1447]

I read a couple of months back the Germans are experimenting with new sail technology to augment the power of diesel engines on cargo vessels.Apparently the sail is more like an enormous parachute or kite which is launched from the ship in the right weather conditions.It is expected to save at least 15% in fuel costs.Will sailing vessels return on a big scale as fossil fuels run down or become very dear?

Hope so. But you get nothing for nothing (TM)

The (enormous) sail will be made of hydrocarbon-based fabrics (oil).
The sail will abrade, suffer UV damage and need to be repaired regularly and replaced eventually.
The sail will need to be managed - the control systems for a large cargo vessel will be powered (not just people winching sheets by hand)
The power will either be auxiliary diesel or solar.
If the latter you need battery banks the size of Belgium (slight exaggeration)

The economics are not obvious to me - I hope it works out (I like playing with what the Americans call sailboats).

Certainly if diesel gets expensive enough, wind power (sail) and/or solar for marine propulsion will become economic.

But if diesel gets expensive enough, the transition to solutions like the above will be imo pretty grim.

[Bobb]

The Germans do great technology b ut they have a tendency to overcomplicate things. If they stopped to think they would realize that they could save 50% of their fuel by only switching on their engines going up the Rhine. Let the current take the boats downstream, like. QED

[Vega1447]

The Germans do great technology b ut they have a tendency to overcomplicate things. If they stopped to think they would realize that they could save 50% of their fuel by only switching on their engines going up the Rhine. Let the current take the boats downstream, like. QED

Not so simple - when drifting down stream/down current/down tide the boat is moving at the same speed as the water/river. There is no flow over the rudder so you "have no steerage" i.e. cannot control the direction of the boat. So avoiding other boats/islands etc would be a problem..

So to control a boat you need a form of propulsion e.g. sail or power.