I would like to thank all those who came out last night to the Working Harbor Committee’s presentation of “Sailing Ships at Work – Past, Present and Future.”   It was a fun evening and gratifying that the presentation was so well received.  In my part of the presentation, I rashly suggested that there is at least the possibility that we could see a return of large cargo-carrying auxiliary sailing ships. Just as a hundred years of cheap energy killed off commercial sail, the economics of continued high fuel costs could support a return to modern sail, for certain types of ships, on specific trade routes.

This brings to mind the recent account of the 47,000 DWT product tanker Nord Integrity. The ship’s captain, Rohit Minocha, took slow steaming one step farther by simply turning off the main engine and let the ship be carried on the winds and currents, covering 280 nm over 3-4 days.  The ship arrived at the loading berth in Algeria on time and the enterprising captain saved Norden, the ship’s owner’s 27 tonnes of fuel oil worth over $17,000 in oil costs.

As reported in Norden’s News Magazine: “Head of NPP Operations, Jens Malund Jensen, gives Captain Rohit Minocha much praise for his initiative.

”This is a captain who is capable of thinking out of the box. Not everyone gets the idea to use nature’s own forces like that. After all, the merchant fleet of vessels switched to engine power several decades ago so it requires innovative thinking to consider using wind and current as the only driving power. In addition, the captain has
understood to use the local wind and current information optimally. Lots of fuel was saved – also of benefit to the environment, the voyage was safely performed, he reached the destination in time, he avoided to sit at anchor in the loading port, and he contributed to better safety at the loading port because the less crowded, the higher the safety. Everything and everyone benefitted from his decision,” says Jens Malund Jensen.”

With fuel oil over $600 a tonne, roughly five times more than it was a decade ago, every little bit counts. Just imagine how much the captain might have saved if the tanker had sails.