sustainability
In 2020, Christiaan De Beukelaer spent 150 days covering 14,000 nautical miles aboard the schooner Avontuur, a hundred-year-old sailing vessel that transports cargo across the Atlantic Ocean. Embarking in Santa Cruz de Tenerife, he wanted to understand the realities of a little-known alternative to the shipping industry on which our global economy relies, and which…
This article explores the political economy of the re-uptake of wind propulsion for maritime cargo transport so as to shift this sector onto a decarbonization pathway.
Seafarers may be invisible; they are also indispensable. Despite the changes caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, it is thanks to seafarers that the life as we know it still mostly exists.
It’s high time the international shipping industry radically curbed its emissions. The industry must set a net-zero target and adopt a realistic plan to meet it.
If wind-propelled cargo vessels should be successful at helping to decarbonise shipping, a shift is needed in the way the industry works.
De honderdduizenden zeelieden die niet aan wal raken, zijn de onzichtbare slachtoffers van de corona-epidemie. Toch zijn de rederijen niet snel geneigd om hun bemanningen te wisselen. Daar moet verandering in komen.
Hundreds of thousands of maritime workers remain stranded at sea because many countries refuse to classify them as “essential workers” – it’s time to bring them home.
Statement from the Crew of the Avontuur, on arrival in Hamburg after six months at sea.
A reflection on being at sea during the COVID-19 pandemic.
I will soon join the schooner Avontuur in her mission to reduce carbon emissions from cargo transport to zero.