An Unusual Sailboat Shines a Light On A Sustainable Future

Energy Observer has visited 88 waterfronts around the world to demonstrate how wind, solar, lithium batteries…and hydrogen fuel cells...can power tomorrow.

By
Timothy Cole
-
Published:
2
Yes, it's a sailboat, with twin vertical sails on a pair of stay-less spars controlled by a pair of custom Harken actuators. Energy Observer's eight hydrogen tanks live in two compartments forward of the spars.

In his younger days, Victorien Erussard was a long-distance solo sailor trying to save seconds per mile on big-time ocean races like La Route du Rhum. Now, Victorien has traded in his maxi-cat for another kind of multihull, but this time he’s trying to save the world.

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Timothy Cole
Timothy Cole
Tim Cole is the chief content officer of Belvoir Media Group, which has published Practical Sailor since 1975. He is a licensed 50-ton U.S. Coast Guard captain.

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2 COMMENTS

  1. It was very difficult to reach this page. When I scanned the newsletter and clicked on “Continue Reading” for this story, I logged in, and that took me to the “My Account” page. There was no indication of where I could find this story, even though by clicking “Continue Reading” I had indicated that I wanted to access this story. There was also no “Contact Us” button to ask how to solve this problem. The only way I was able to get to the story was to leave your website, go back to the newsletter, scroll down to the story, and click on “Continue Reading” again, which because I was already logged in took me to the story. If you guys are going to go all-digital, you’ll have to have a more functional website. Incidentally, when I went to the website again, there was no button for “My Account”. If you’re going to have a selective set of buttons to get to a limited number of pages of your website, one of those buttons has to be “Site Map” with buttons for EVERY page on your website.

  2. I think practical sailor just needs a trained and qualified web designer or maybe a few. I too have experienced the same problem and a few others as well. For some reason, there are many times when only a few or none of the images for a given page actually load. Also, the quality and production of videos is just average, considering most most online video producers especially on YouTube are amateurs, it is not a high standard. Since Practical Sailor is going online in less than a month, it might be a good oppurtunity to make some adjustments in web design and function. I have been an avid reader of Practical Sailor since the 80’s and I am glad to see that you guys are making the transition to an all online publication.