More to come as Ortomarine continues to go green
AS THE world began to return to some semblance of normality, it became evident that businesses worldwide had taken the opportunities afforded by the lockdowns to re-evaluate their business activities.
However, the impacts of climate change and the associated environmental problems prompted Worcestershire-based Ortomarine to make a significant announcement recently. The company announced that from early March, it would only accept orders for boats that had some form of electric propulsion.
This major decision is in line with the Government’s Green Maritime Plan, which states that by 2025 it is expected that all new vessels being ordered for use in UK waters (including the inland waterways) will be designed with zero emissions propulsion capability.
This, along with the Government’s wish for boats to be ‘gas and solid fuel free’, was very much in keeping with Ortomarine's aim to build environmentally friendly boats, and in doing so, reduce the vessels’ carbon footprint.
A few weeks after this announcement, Ortomarine’s Caroline Badger said that the company had taken part in the Virtual Crick Boat Show (as an exhibitor) and had noticed “more than ever, the interest in green boating”. She also highlighted: “Interestingly, the three favourite boats in the show were all hybrid boats, two serial hybrids and one parallel hybrid.”
Making more environmentally friendly products should only ever be part of any responsible business’s plan to reduce carbon emissions, so it was good to find out that the company is taking steps to reduce its overall carbon footprint as much as possible. Caroline said they were looking forward to taking delivery of their first all-electric van in April 2021 and are in discussions with their landlord about switching to a green, renewable energy supplier.
She went on to say: “We always aim to minimise waste by evaluating our processes and ensuring they are as efficient as possible.” It is also good to hear that they are encouraging suppliers to reduce plastic packaging and any other packaging which is not recyclable.
Although many boat builders use reclaimed materials for fit-outs, the materials on offer aren’t always ideal so it is good to see that Ortomarine is addressing this aspect of its build process by looking at where it can substitute existing materials for more environmentally friendly ones.
It uses only FSC® certified timber products and by using high quality and proper closed cell spray foam, which has a very low global warming potential (GWP) of one, as well as zero Ozone Depletion Potential (ODP), the company feels its boats are insulated effectively without hurting the environment.
It is also looking into heat recovery systems, water source heat pumps and wind turbines for future projects; however, the latter two will be a challenge, particularly for a narrowboat, compared with a widebeam.
With so many boats on the system dieselpowered and therefore their owners rarely needing to consider a total engine replacement, the question of how to help boaters address the issue of carbon emissions has been raised by many.
Ortomarine is looking into developing a kit for converting existing diesel-powered boats to electric propulsion. Caroline added: “We are actually converting one of our earlier diesel engine boats into a serial electric hybrid as a test case and will be publishing information about this in the coming months.”
It is good to see a company looking at the whole picture, including the entire supply chain, not just the end product. It will also be interesting to see the results of the conversion kit it is currently working on.