Our World and Everything in It

There were a lot of small boaters out there this weekend. A small boat or pontoon is much more economical these days. There were more aluminum and pontoon boats than usual.  But regardless of high gas prices, the boats came and went. And my neighbor still got a lot of “look sees” from potential buyers interested in his small boat and large pontoon that are for sale.  I started to wonder if someone had invented a boat covered with photovoltaic cells yet and decided to look it up. Sure enough the Dutch have a speedboat like that called the Czeers MK-1. It even sounds fast. http://www.ecogeek.org/content/view/1693/

A solar panel is also used on the Whitley 2800 30 ft. luxury cruiser, but only to power all the high tech galley appliances, flat screen tv, and audio on board. The cruiser itself is not solar powered but uses twin diesel engines. The company is working on an all solar powered boat.

I want to know if used cooking oil can be used in a marine diesel engine? If not, why not if a diesel auto engine runs on the stuff?

Besides solar power for boats, which seems the most logical energy source to use, there is also a model that plugs in. A small, hybrid, fiberglass boat that can be recharged is available. Three hours of charge gets eight hours of battery time on its 20 hp engine by Yamaha. The boat also runs on gas, just in case I assume. I don’t know how much of a power draw the three hour charge is either.  

Lastly, a DIY solar powered pontoon boat (not a small one) was featured on Treehugger. It runs totally on solar panels or batteries, no gas, no emissions, and no noise.  Although I do like the sound of a fast boat, at least when I’m on it.  http://www.treehugger.com/files/2005/12/the_loon_solar-.php

This entry was posted on Monday, July 7th, 2008 at 5:26 pm and is filed under Alternative Energy, Alternative Energy Sources, Conservation, Environmentalism, Green Products, Green Retailers, Solar Energy. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.