Possible Return of the Age of Sail Eventually

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In terms of fuel efficiency, sailing vessels have an absolute advantage over motorized vessels. Motorized vessels have a power source, often diesel, and a means of power transmission to a propeller. Since environmentalism is abounding so much today, there is high awareness of the simple Euclidean geometric fact that a sphere has a finite volume, and seemingly regardless of measurements that quality of finiteness is paramount. It is true that we have finite quantities of pre-developed hydrocarbons and as such it will eventually run out. For this reason, non-fueled methods of shipping ought to be appreciated. Such methods have existed for thousands of years already though: rowing and sailing.

There are, however, two main detriments to sailing and two main advantages to motorized transport. These are thus: speed and wind. A motorized transport can travel much faster and consistently than a sailing ship. However, as costs for petrol increase due to supply and demand, the cost of motorized transportation may eventually become prohibitive enough to derive a benefit over cost from sailed transportation. Also, sailing ships can be designed to incorporate such ancient features as the usage of oars, much like Greek triremes and Roman biremes and the galleys of more recent times. The prudential design for oar usage would facilitate motion of the ship when otherwise the ship would just be becalmed, and such would reduce time lost due to bad wind conditions.

All this said though, I think that at some point it may be more cost effective to have sea transport by sailing vessels again, and as such I think that would actually be more beautiful as well since sailing vessels are, at the very least, graceful constructions, even if not the most practical at this exact point in history.

Pure sailing vessels cannot keep schedules reliably since the weather is quirky. Sail with a motor back up (for periods when the wind has died) would be required for predictable voyages.

How can sail deliver 30-35 knots? Also the bulk capacity of sailing vessels is limited. The clippers had to carry so much canvas that some cargo capacity had to be sacrificed.

ruveyn

It's a matter of cost versus benefit. If gasoline prices ever shot up to, say, $50 per gallon, then would it be worth it to continue shipping by plane or motorized boat?

Do you know what an oxymoron is?

A sentence that contains 'possible' and 'eventually' in reference to the same thing?

I suspect that qualifies as an oxymoron.

Sailing vessels used a route around Antarctica where the winds are very strong only in one direction...

So using a vessel that takes several months through extremely dangerous situations, and very limited cargo space... As opposed to just a week or two of travel, minor danger and vast amounts of space.

Yes, and no fuel usage aside from feeding the crew. It has been done successfully for hundreds of years upon the open sea and thousands of years between closer ports.

Because of the lack of technology, not because of a romantic ideal they were following.

[quote="iamnotaparakeet"]



It's a matter of cost versus benefit. If gasoline prices ever shot up to, say, $50 per gallon, then would it be worth it to continue shipping by plane or motorized boat?[/quote

Nuclear powered vessels would then become competitive in cost. We already have several nuclear CVs that need to be refueled once every 20 years. They can make their own drinking water so the only provisions they need take on is food (for a civilian vessel) and in addition arms for a military vessel.

For small recreational ships, sail might be the better choice or electrically powered boats and ships with the batteries recharged by electricity produced at nuclear generating stations.

We are not going back to pure sailing vessels. They cannot keep a reliable schedule and they are limited in their cargo capacity which is why we have powered vessels in the first place.

ruveyn

Nuclear power should remain only in military hands though, and eventually petroleum will have to be for military usage only as well.

I'm not advocating "pure" sailing vessels. First of all, even during the age of sail, when a ship is becalmed they got men in row boats and towed the ship until the wind picked up. If the ships are designed to accommodate sets of oars, like a trireme, then such a function would be readily performable. Perhaps deploy-able solar panels and an electric propeller would help to provide extra assistance when there is lack of wind and not in a current.

Sails, or wind turbines, might well make a comeback as auxilaries to diesel power ships.
The part about oars isnt too feasible. Even third world labor is too expensive for the thousands of man hours it would take to row even a small modern cargo ship the way they powered the ancient slave galleys. you're gonna have to have fossil fuel burning engines even if you are able to add somekind of wind catching tech.

Cargo ships dont have to go as fast as warships ( ie over thirty knots).

The liberty ships of world war two (assembly line built frieghters) and modern super tankers are actually slower than the all-sail clipper ships of the 19th centurey.

The reason we dont use clipper ships now is that they were so small a so streamlined that they hardly carried any cargo. Theres the canvas issue as well-but coal-buring ships have to carry coal bunkers, and oil burning ships have to have oil tanks, etc.

Theres a 10 thousand ton (medium sized) German expiremental frieghter with "a kite" that floats hurndreds of feet above and in front of the ship that pulls it along guite well. But it still has a convential diesel powerplant for when the wind aint there.

To be free of fossil fuels you might see a return to the ships typical of the late 19th centurey that had both smoke stacks AND full rigged sails. They will use the sails when there is a favorable wind. The rest of the time they will burn old tires and other urban plastic and paper garbage for steam. Youll see these ships ply the Pacific for the already growing trade in carrying garbage from America to China for the chinese to recyle the american waste back into industrial materials ( so some of the cargo could be used as fuel, or some of the fuel could be sold as cargo if they had good winds). They might pollute a little bit but these vessels would be free from fossil fuels.