The next decade will see more innovation in ocean-bound technologies than possibly the past 100 years combined.
Advances in low-cost private satellites, artificial intelligence, advanced robotics, cloud data storage, and communication, are opening up new frontiers in ocean-bound transportation.
However, Forbes reports that a surprising propulsion technology is also making an appearance that could re-disrupt the global shipping industry: wind.
Big comeback in the making
The wind is about to make a big comeback in shipping. New ship designs being experimented with that include a combination of hard sails, rotating cylinders, kites, and bubbles underneath the hull show just how radically different large, ocean-bound ships could look by 2030.
Wind-powered vessels are significantly lower polluting than the heavy fuel oils currently being used in shipping around the world.
Scope for employment
Rather than embracing this transformation, regulators are dragging their heels – both internationally and in the United States. In doing so, they are missing the opportunity to widen the economic pie for overall maritime transportation.
The next few years are a unique window to create tens of thousands of new manufacturing jobs around the world, establish innovative new high-tech shipbuilding clusters, transform ship energy systems and radically reduce global greenhouse gases by transporting more goods via internal waterways than by road or air.
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Source: Forbes
