Why Cargo Ships Are Bringing Back Sails to Cut Emissions

0:00 At the start of 2026, there were between 50,000 and 116,000 shipping vessels trading some sort of cargo on the ocean. And that is an incredible number. And if you really think of what we're looking at from shipping and climate change. Shipping is responsible for 2.1% of the global CO2 emissions, according to the International Maritime Organization, the IMO. And we're gonna be talking about how some of those shipping companies are trying to not only save costs on fuel, but also help the environment by reducing their CO2 emissions. So we're gonna talk about that on today's episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast, because this is where you find all of your latest ocean news, your sustainability news, here Monday to Friday.

0:47 If you like this type of information, just hit the follow button on your favorite podcast app, 'cause you'll be able to hear it every Monday to Friday. Now, this week, we have an interview on Friday. We're gonna be talking to Alexandre Mendron. He owns a boating company where he sells boats. And part of that, what he's really proud of, is his electric vehicle boats, so his electric motors that he sells on a regular basis now and he's working with a bunch of makers. He creates the motors in a manufacturing plant in Montreal and then ships them out worldwide. And it's really interesting to see how he got into it and what he likes so much about it. So that's on Friday if you wanna hear that interview. All you have to do is hit the follow button to make sure you get all the interviews on Fridays.

1:29 And also, if you wanna support the show, you can go to our Patreon site to support the work that I do. That's speakupforblue.com/patreon. That's speakupforblue.com/patreon. Okay. Let's get into the show, because this is something that's really interesting, 'cause global shipping moves roughly between 80 and 90% of the world trade volume. Like, think about that for a second. Like, that is a pretty big amount in terms of what we're looking at shipping. Everything we get, like all the stuff that we get from Amazon, all the stuff that we get that's shipped anywhere or even that's created and made overseas, especially if you're in North America or even if you're in Europe, gets shipped to those places. That's incredibly, incredibly large amount of percentages, right?

2:11 And then the industry, like I mentioned before, is responsible for close to 2.1% of the global CO2 emissions, according to the IMO, the International Marine Organization. And companies are now retrofitting massive cargo vessels with rigid sails and wind structures instead of relying only on new fuels. So that's a really big deal here, where you have a shipping industry that is massively important to the world in terms of how much it ships of the cargo and how much it's involved in trade. We also know that it presents a large CO2 emissions and it has a problem, and it needs to fix that. And there are a lot of organizations, a lot of of governments who are putting regulations on CO2. So whether they're gonna be putting it on the flag that these ships are sailing with, whether it be Canadian or anywhere in the European Union or anywhere in Asia, they will have to do something at some point, and it might be now.

3:03 Cargill's Pyxis Ocean is a company, was fitted with two WingWing sails, each standing 37.5 meters tall. And as of mid-2026, more than 100 large cargo ships, over 400 gross tons, have wind propulsion systems installed worldwide. Now, the International Maritime Organization set a target, just as I said, of at least 40% emissions reduction from shipping by 2030, with a net zero by 2050. So that's a lot between like, you know, going from 40% all the way to 100% by 2050 in 20 years. So a lot of the work has to, and infrastructure has to be put up now. So fuel costs and tightening emissions regulations are pushing ship owners towards proven low-risk technology rather than waiting on new fuels like ammonia or methanol, right?

3:48 And wind is free once the hardware is installed. So unlike alternative fuels which require new infrastructure, so instead of building all the infrastructure that's needed for like ammonia fuels or methanol-based fuels, which are still will cause pollution, you can go back to the old school way of getting across the ocean and use sails, because wind is free when it's there. And now things will be changing with wind, and the trade winds might be changing due to climate change. But we will see vessels and we're starting to see vessels who are actually trying to use wind propulsion to help offset some of the costs of fuel. Fuel efficiency is one of the most important things 'cause it's so expensive. And now with everything happening in Iran, with everything happening in the Strait of Hormuz and other places around the world, ships being blown up, cargo not getting to where it needs to go, especially with oil and things like that, there's gonna be a demand for safe and fuel-efficient transportation, and we're getting close to seeing that already.

4:41 And then of course, wind can assist to cut fuel anywhere from 1% to 47%, depending on the number of sails and the wind conditions at the time. So it's never gonna be perfect. It's never gonna be to 100%. I'm not saying we're replacing fuels altogether, but we're getting to a point where we can r-replace almost up to half. And 100-plus ships with wind propulsion installed are estimated to be saving around 100,000 tons of CO2 equivalent per year combined. I think at the beginning of the show, I said they're responsible for 2.1% of that CO2. And that'll be reduced significantly over that time. I don't know what that equates to in terms of percentages, but that's a pretty big chunk. Now, purpose-built wind-assisted ships could see a 50% average reduction in fuel consumption per the International Windship Association.

5:25 So this is coming. This is already here. To scale it to get to where we want is really difficult, 'cause right now, about one in 500 or one to a thousand ships will have some sort of wind propulsion device on there. But it doesn't necessarily mean that everybody's gonna have them. To scale that is going to be difficult. But the barrier really is the way the commercial contract structure is set. So essentially, the primary obstacle for wind-assisted propulsion in global shipping is now commercial rather than technological. So the technology is there, but shipping's long-established commercial model separates ownership from the actual operation, so the charter. So the owners invest in vessels and onboard technologies, while charterers typically control fuel consumption and voyage decisions.

6:11 So this creates a split incentive. So owners bear the cost of installing efficiency technologies, but charterers who control fuel decisions capture the immediate financial and environmental benefits. So fixing this would take standardized charter agreements that split costs and savings fairly. There's still a lot of things that have to do with the infrastructure of the shipping industry, which I don't know much of. I'll be honest. I don't know much about how this all works. But if there's a separation between the owner incentive and the charterer's incentive, and the owners will be building the fuel efficiency part, will be building like the upfront cost and paying for the capital, and the charterers are more for the fuel efficient, like actually spending on fuel. So that, you know, they might work together and be like, "Hey, we can both make money off of this." But that's something that's, gonna be a question in the future, and probably one of the biggest challenges.

6:54 Now, the International Maritime Organization's 2023 strategy formally recognized wind and other zero or near zero technologies as part of the path to decarbonization targets. No dedicated subsidies exist yet for wind propulsion systems in most regions. So adoption is gonna be driven by rising carbon costs, so the carbon offset cost, and regulation rather than direct government incentives. Now even think about everything that's happening now in the world with oil and gas going up and down depending on what's happening, and diesel going up and down and being very, very expensive at this point. Shipping is gonna get more expensive, which is gonna make our products more expensive. Being able to increase fuel efficiency by reducing fuel costs is gonna be probably at the top of the list for a lot of these shipping companies and even the companies who use shipping to get their products to you at a specific time.

7:40 Of course, EU as the EU always is, the funded research projects called WAS or Sail Horizon or Optiwise are supporting sea trials and validation in the North Sea region. So there are things that people can do with all of this happening around us, right? There are things that we can look at, there are things that we could spend time at and experiment, but we have to go faster than normal. And I like how the wind aspect is, moving forward with this type of technology. So I think it's really good. Now, stuff that you can do is you can look for shipping and logistics companies that disclose emissions data and wind-assist adoption when choosing brands that ship internationally. That information is not always easy to find. I'm gonna be honest, like I had trouble looking for that.

8:21 But if you have a product that's shipping from say, the east to the west or vice versa, you would wanna look at what type of companies they use to ship. I think they should be saying if they wanna be transparent in their supply chain so that people know - like where all this comes from, how it gets there, how advanced. 'Cause that I think is a benefit to talk about is, "Hey, look, our ship uses wind propulsion to get to where you are, so we reduce CO2 emissions, and we increase fuel efficiency, which helps in the pricing of your product." And for consumer relations, I think that's a big deal, but I don't know if the industry thinks that's a big deal or companies actually care about that. But that's something that I care about. That's something you can ask your products, the people that sell your products, you can ask them to do that, but I don't know if that'll actually ever happen.

9:02 Now, of course, obviously we can support the policy conversations pushing the IMO's 2030 and 2050 targets of eventually going net zero, near net zero as they stay pretty ambitious. Old technology is solving a modern problem. Like think about that. Using sails, using winds is still solving a modern problem. And I think that's a real shift in looking at decarbonization. It's a matter of like, hey, how do we make sure that like going back to the old ways might take a little longer, or if we use it in combination, might not take a little longer, but when we can use wind, that would be much better. You can travel quite fast with wind using as propulsion. And I think that's like an interesting concept to say, let's go back in time, and let's look at what worked before, so we don't have to worry about what works in the future.

9:45 Sometimes using fuel is not a good idea, especially in the type of world we're living in right now, where we're seeing the direct climate change consequences happening in front of our eyes. This week is all going to be about looking at ways that we can be more efficient within businesses and what businesses are doing to be more efficient, like the shipping industry. I thought that was kind of important, especially with our guest, Alexandre Mongeon, who's gonna be joining us. We're gonna be talking about electric motors for boats, which I think is always interesting. And tomorrow, we're actually gonna be spending more time on boats. We're gonna be looking at boat-sharing economies, just like ride-share. And so we're gonna see where that's gonna take us. And later on, we're gonna be talking about 4Oceans and their business model, and how we can earn living wages on the Thursday's episode in coastal action.

10:30 So we're gonna be talking about all of that this week. So hit that follow button if you already haven't, so that you don't miss any of the episodes Monday to Friday on the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. And of course, if you wanna support the podcast and all the other work I do on Beyond Jaws, our other podcast, and on YouTube, and on Instagram, and on TikTok, and Facebook, and all those wonderful places, you can go to speakupforblue.com/patreon and join our Patreon to help support all the work I do on this type of subject, on the ocean, being that resource for you for the ocean. So I wanna thank you so much for joining me on today's episode of the How to Protect the Ocean podcast. Have a great day. We'll talk to you next time, and happy conservation.