“We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.” Albert Einstein
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The TRYBRID Project will deliver a technology demonstrator for the new energy agenda that has never before been seen: a project that will for the first time, close the loop on both use of renewable energy, and its onboard production. Photovoltaic solar energy will electrolyze, compress and store hydrogen, to be reused in extended ocean passages. Natural gas will be mixed with hydrogen to reduce the diesel consumption to around 15% of the fuel mix, and natural gas ‘reformed’ to make hydrogen. Hydrogen will also power a fuel cell, to power the main electric engine. The extreme trimaran hull form, with it’s demonstration solar hydrogen gear will be taken on a display tour of the worlds capital cities, in an effort to demonstrate that the new energy agenda is as much about today, as it is a dream of the tomorrow. Given soaring oil prices and carbon based climate change concerns, the TRYBRID project is ‘an idea whose time has arrived’.
Australia’s dominance as designer of the best of the world’s fast ferries, and a recent shift in the Australian government’s attitude around the dangers of CO2, and the risks of peak oil, combine to make the naval architectural design of this project, a logical Australian duty.
This website details the boats design purpose and features. We look at the designers, builders, academics, government and corporate sponsors who are engaged on the project, along with the aid teams with whom the boat will be working, after its world technology demonstration tour. The site follows the progress of the project, currently in the design stages.
The Trybrid Project aims to develop a fuel minimalist marine transport prototype using solar hybrid drives on a 34.5m long, thin hulled, trimaran platform.
As peak oil predictions are weighed in with the risks of CO2 driven climate change, the global energy debate is fast shifting from awareness, to solutions. Marine transport is the heavy lifter in the fossil fuel transport sector, yet unlike the automotive industry, finding more fuel efficient ways to move goods and people across oceans has lost traction in sea of bunker oil. This, at a time when we wonder how the fast intercontinental connector known as aviation will cope, when fossil fuel will become too pricey, either environmentally, or in dollars per barrel, or both.
The Trybrid Project is about developing a prototype in swift marine transport that has hybrid power sources, tiny fuel consumption, ‘incredibly long and narrow’ hull forms, and amphibious/shallow water capability. It’s an exercise in preparing for a climate changed world.
Much of the innovative design work in the super efficient hull form has been pioneered by the exceptional naval architect, Nigel Irens with his initial ILAN and then the 1998 Cable and Wireless Adventurer, both very fuel efficient boats, whilst at the same time holding the around Britain, and around the world speed records, respectively. The recent record attempt by Peter Bethune on the Craig Loomes’s designed and bio-fueled Earthrace, again successfully deploys the long, wave piecing hull form. The Trybrid is the next evolutionary step in this process, building on the super efficient hull form, whilst adding the hybrid power sources of solar, diesel, biofuel, and some off-the-wind sail auxiliary. This same long thin hull form, in the Trybrid case, at 34.5m, sees a hull width which is a mere 6-7% of its length, where the transverse stability is provided by small outer hulls…a modified trimaran concept. In an odd way, this is a return to the traditional indigenous outrigger canoe, but using new materials, new ideas, and urgent planetary obligation.
The objectives of the Trybrid Project are simple and several fold. The primary objective is to pioneer a marine transport platform that will cover long distances at swift speeds, with tiny fuel use. It may potentially be a rare transport mode that makes and stores sizable fuel stores of its own making. The ancillary objective is to provide a platform to demonstrate the hybrid combination of technologies in solar/diesel electric propulsion, amphibious capacity, solar / hydrogen and battery technology all embodied in radical a new hull forms. The resting place or project specific objective, is to build a boat for fast response, post-disaster support.
The project is a global team play, and the general ideas developed are available to the global consciousness without patent, to promote rather than discourage the take-up of the new naval architectural form and new energy use. After the 2010 launch , and beyond the initial 1 or 2 year world technology display tour, this first boat is headed for use where long distance fuel economy is important, where ambulance speed is an issue, and where the boats amphibious, fold out nature, is ideal for post disaster practicality.
The project is being designed through 2007/8, with funding raised and working models tested in 2008. The boat will be built in Asia during 2009/10, and launched in 2010 or 2011, for 2 years of initial use on a global ‘show and tell’ tour, before going into part time aid work thereafter. The boat will likely be built in Asia using lightweight plantation timbers, strip planked, then sheathed and faired in an epoxy glass, to a sponge down, gloss finish.
The naval architecture comes from some of the world’s best fast ferry, design innovators, in Australia, through One2Three Design. Solar electric engineering design has been guided by Sydney’s Solar Sailor, chaired by former Prime Minister Hawke. Research and design interchange with the Australian Marine College in Launceston commenced in 2006, with thesis studies reviewing the diesel electric fuel reduction feasibility. Aspirations are evolving into other areas of collaboration, with, for example, the construction of an 8m working model being scheduled for deployment with the Australian Marine College in 2008. Project manager Rod Davis is based at the Asian orientated tip of Australia’s Great Barrier Reefs, in the small, fast ferry town of Port Douglas. Engineering and electrical components will be is a mix of Asian, European and American technology.