Richard Sauter is seeing green again. So soon after introducing the “first zero carbon” megayacht Transcendence, his Sauter Carbon Offset Design has now unveiled Black Magic. The 120 metre-long, 4,000-tonne solar hybrid vessel is said to have the potential of reducing GHG emissions by 75-100% by harnessing energy from the sun, wind and waves. Like his megayacht, the Black Magic is still a concept but Mr Sauter has no doubts that it’s “the only realistic super green alternative to the highly pollutant tankers in use and still being built at an alarming rate.”
Mr Sauter calculates that over the next 20 years, his dream tanker could cut emissions by 75% from the 16 supertanker newbuilding orders booked by a Chinese shipyard two years ago – for a total reduction in GHG emissions of 40 million tonnes. The Black Magic is based essentially on the same technology behind the Transcendence with the following key features:
- Mercedes Benz & MTU Bluetec diesel electric power generation (1200kws)
- Solar cells (200kws)
- Hydro and aerodynamic advances in wave piercing pentamaran hull design
- Azimuth counter rotating CLT high torque propeller systems
- Power sailing regeneration (100 to 200kws)
- State of the art fully rotational Wing Sails (300 to 500kws)
- KER (kinetic energy regeneration)
- Maximum solar cell deployment. (2,000 square meters)
- Energy efficient equipment, including AC & refrigeration with waste heat recovery
- Computerized energy management, maintenance & guidance.
- Lithium UPS
Solar cells, power sailing regeneration, KER and plug-in power sources charge a lithium-ion storage system that runs all hotel services including AC, day and night. The same lithium UPS allows Black Magic to achieve her maximum speed or navigate harbors and inland water ways with zero emissions. Combine all this, Mr Sauter says, with 300 to 500kws of Wing Sail propulsion and you arrive at virtually unlimited zero carbon cruising at an average speed of 10 knots. That could increase to 12 knots with the use of an optional Sky Sail.
With his latest concept, Mr Sauter may strike some people as a maritime Don Quixote. In a way, he is. The difference is that the fictional character created by Spanish novelist Miguel de Cervantes was suffering from delusions of grandeur and was totally out of sync with reality. Mr Sauter, though a seeming romantic, has his feet planted firmly on the ground. He certainly speaks of what is real when he says: “The North Pole is little more than a fragmented pile of frozen debris, cargo vessels going between Japan and Germany have cut 4000 miles off the journey. This is the good news. The bad news is that the Greenland ice sheet is likely to disappear a lot sooner than predicted.” ~Barista Uno
