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The Energy Observers continues its tour of the globe

9528 Views Posted on: 13/07/2017

Energy Observer, the first autonomous hydrogen ship ever, stopped in Paris, this Tuesday 6th of July, after taking off from Saint-Malo by the end of June. As a reminder, the ship is on for a world tour that will last 6 years : « An odyssey for the future », as its creators, Victorien Erusard and Jérôme Delafosse, like to call the project and as written on their website.

The crew of the futuristic vessel has been the guests of the French Transition énergétique minister, Nicolas Hulot, and the mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo. The only vessel that works with renewable energies dropped anchor in Paris, for a period of time going from the 6th of July to the 16th of the same month. The catamaran will make a few other stops at other French stations before going around the globe.

The Energy Observer was first designed as a sport catamaran. It took four years to build it, after which the designers have been rewarded with the first price of the Trophée Jules Vernes in 1994. Energy Observer is the marine alter-ego of Solar Impulse, the plane that entirely works with solar energy and that has been around the world from March the 9th, 2015, to the 26th of July in 2016, taking a stopovers along the way.

The futuristic vessel holds no main sail. «People often ask us why we don’t make sailing boats… But men know how to sail such boats ! We wanted to prove that ecology doesn’t mean to live as a hermit somewhere in the desert. It’s hight-tech solution that need to be elaborated in the upcoming years ». In the case of the Energy Observer catamaran, many different kinds of renewable technologies will be used during the odyssey, without causing any pollution whatsoever.

The vesse has 130 m2 of solar panels, 2 wind turbines, 8 hydrogen tanks and 50 meters of flying wing. All these energy sources may take the lead in case of a technical trouble, as complementary energies.

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