The engineers and designers of the Vripack design bureau love to solve complex problems and get real pleasure from this process. In the creative wort of this Dutch “brewery” (as they call their studio!) All kinds of innovative ideas are constantly emerging, which are reflected in current projects and from time to time splash out in the form of very non-trivial concepts. This is how Futura was born, which Marnix Hoekstra and Bart Bauhais, creative directors of Vripack, presented to journalists at a virtual press conference.
The trigger for this concept project was a request from a client looking to build a superyacht capable of doing without fossil fuels. But this does not mean that the studio has not previously looked in this direction.
“We perceive current trends as undercurrents that shape the world and shape the behavior of society,” says Marnix Hoekstra. “You shouldn’t confuse them with momentary fashion: these are fundamental processes that ensure such qualitative changes as, for example, the transition to an economy with zero waste production.”
Vripack intuitively understands that a new wave is coming, although they do not know when and where we will have to meet with it. But the fact remains: the shift in the energy sector is obvious, the engines of the future will never be the same as the engines of the past, and the “environmental” agenda, which has long occupied one of the main places in developed countries, will remain with us for a long time. One could argue that the yachting industry is a hulking whale, drifting in the ocean of life by itself, while the land world is busy with its own affairs. However, this is not quite true. Inspired by the experience and achievements of Elon Musk, Vripack engineers understand that they need to start from scratch and put innovative technologies in a beautiful shell, applying a humanistic approach to design.
Outside
Thinking over the exterior of the Futura and defining its basic lines, the designers wanted to make it very difficult to calculate the length of the yacht from a distance. Indeed, even in the pictures, this 66-meter boat can easily pull both 80 and 100 meters. Its avant-garde appearance with an abundance of organic forms will appeal primarily to the younger, less conservative generation, which Vripack was guided by. The convex glazing of the relatively short and squat superstructure gives it the shape of a cocoon. Glass walls (and in some places the floor!) Allow the gaze to penetrate the rooms, which creates an unforgettable sense of space with a lot of unusual viewing angles.
Vripack is ready to scale Futura from 55 to 100+ meters
Special cellular glazing allows you to create complex glass surfaces
The owner’s cabin is in the bow of the ship
There are two tenders on board, 9 m and 6 m long
The layouts of Futura’s decks are far from the usual: wide central ladders prevail on board, connecting peculiar seating areas, and the multi-level is very unusually implemented. For example, the overhang above the open dining area is located at a height of one and a half decks, and arriving guests disembark from the tender not on a narrow aft platform, but into an open lobby almost at water level, where they are met by the crew and from where they can immediately get into their cabins on the lower deck passing the spa area and gym. Vripack developed the Futura design using virtual reality tools, which it adopted as one of the first in the yachting industry, not forgetting all the design points paramount for safe navigation.
Inside
Now the main thing: where does the yacht take energy for movement and how does it store it? Vripack identified four key technologies that will keep Futura completely green.
Firstly, the yacht is supposed to use environmentally neutral biofuel (100 tonnes reserve) as fuel, which allows to reduce CO2 and SOx and NOx emissions by 90% compared to diesel. Biofuels have long been produced on an industrial scale, and according to Marnix, they can be freely refueled, for example, in the port of Rotterdam. And then it’s up to the market: if there is demand, supply will appear.
Secondly, it is planned to equip cruising diesel engines with gasifiers: they, in fact, serve as a catalyst for those 10% of harmful emissions that are still inherent in biofuels.
Lammert de Wit, CEO of Dutch startup Suwotec
Instead of thinking about cleaning up the gases coming out of the engine, we suggest focusing on what’s going into the engine. If you optimize the fuel supply, the composition of the combustible mixture and the combustion process itself, then the exhaust will inevitably become cleaner. The gasifier developed by us at a certain frequency injects a mixture of liquids into the cylinders: part of this mixture improves the combustion of fuel, making it more complete at a low temperature, which is good for the engine, while the other part does not burn in the cylinders and starts working in the exhaust, where it reacts with unstable connections, rendering them harmless. The remaining pollutants are captured by an active filter at the outlet, and in general the gasifier can reduce their content in the exhaust by 90%. In addition, unlike diesel particulate filters, it does not increase engine wear and does not itself become a source of pollution at the end of operation.
Thus, the output is completely clean exhaust, which not only meets the requirements of IMO Tier III, but also exceeds all future standards. In addition, this solution saves space, since bulky SCR catalysts are not needed, and the compact gasifiers that are going to be used on the Futura are comparable in size to a gearbox.
To generate electricity, engineers suggest using “kite generators”. When properly designed and operated, this fairly simple system proves to be energetically beneficial and, in the presence of wind, can cover at least part of the energy costs on board. The principle of its operation is simple: the kite is released into the sky, due to the force of the wind, it unwinds the end from the drum of the winch, which is connected to the generator. The control system can control the kite so that it describes a figure eight in the air, and when the end is selected or the wind is weak, it brings it to its original position. In the case of two kites, one of them is always in the sky and the generation of electricity does not stop.
By the way, when asked why Vripack decided not to deal with solar panels and hydrogen, Marnix and Bart replied that with the efficiency of existing panels of only 23-25%, Futura does not have enough area to obtain the required amount of energy, and hydrogen, in addition to high operational risks , requires the installation of complex and very large equipment.
Finally, for energy storage, Vripack chose an unusual battery based on environmentally neutral materials from the Dutch startup Suwotec. They use salt, sand and leaves (!) In combination with ceramic electrodes. With a similar specific energy content, they are larger and heavier than lithium (27 kWh / 1 m3 / € 2700), but cheaper, safer, can be discharged and charged at the same time, and also have a long service life without restrictions on the number of working cycles.
Skeptics will surely say that with such a set of “miracles” Futura has no chance of materializing, but Vripack thinks otherwise. For all the “freshness” of the proposed concept, it does not belong to the category of fantastic projects. According to Marnix and Bart, all the technologies used in the design of Futura are already worked out or are in the last stages of development, and if you compile a list of shipyards prone to innovation, the first ten of them are quite capable of building such a vessel. In the meantime, Vripack invites you to look at Futura from different angles in its virtual gallery.
Text
Anton Cherkasov-Nisman
Chief Editor
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