Environmental impact of sailing activities

[GordMay]

Originally Posted by Cadence

GordMay, I think you missed the as it related to breathing. It was totally in jest. The OP was good given the specifics but only cited a very small sector of cruising scenarios.. What prompted picking at sailing as apposed many other polluting activities beats the hell out of me.

I did miss the grin.
Sailing/cruising is our commonality.

[250224]

Originally Posted by Kenomac

I never wrote that the OP said any of those things, and by the way.... that's news to me that our 62 is over in Europe; the last time I checked, it was in Maine

@Kenomac: my mistake, I thought you were sailing in the Mediterranean (and (regularly) flying in from the States).

Apart from transportation, extensive motoring, heating in winter, I believe the impact of Sailors are negligible. Also with (occasional) plastic falling over board I don't see a problem, the main influx comes from few rivers (acc. to https://phys.org/news/2017-06-plasti...rce-ocean.html).

But anyway, vive la Multihullture ;-)

[valhalla360]

Originally Posted by inspectr

There is a wonderful caution in some Australian National parks

"Take only photographs, leave ONLY footprints"

What a fundamentally true statement about YOUR impact on this unique and fragile ball of dust in infinite space.

Do you realize how nasty some of the chemicals used in photography are?

Just because you don't see them doesn't mean they don't exist.

Short of eliminating yourself from the ecosystem, you are going to have an impact.

You will poop no matter if you are on your boat, a cruise ship or spending the weekend weaving clothes out of discarded duct tape.

This highlights a major problem with the eco-movement...throw out scary numbers without putting them into context.

[valhalla360]

Originally Posted by a64pilot

I think nature abhors a monoculture.
By that I mean grow millions of acres of corn, and every thing you can think of that eats corn of course shows up, bugs, fungus etc. It’s why pesticides etc has to be used.
There are so many people on this planet that I think there will be some form of Plague eventually, something will eventually overwhelm our health care.

Actually, we are coming into balance in terms of population but as a long lived species, it takes several decades.

The overall population growth rate is plumeting. Most modernized economies have shrinking growth rates (without immigration). Even developing countries are fast approaching zero growth rates.

Projections are 50-75yrs from now the total population will be shrinking (even with growth rates negative, it takes a while before the population follows).

Now will we face challenges in the mean time? Sure but this change is occurring without significant contribution from war, disease or famine. It's also not due to anything the eco-faithful have told us about the evils of being alive.

It's simply individuals choosing to have fewer children...most can be traced back to economic incentives (the days of 8 kids so you had free farm labor are long gone).

[Kenomac]

Originally Posted by blu3534

@Kenomac: my mistake, I thought you were sailing in the Mediterranean (and (regularly) flying in from the States).

Apart from transportation, extensive motoring, heating in winter, I believe the impact of Sailors are negligible. Also with (occasional) plastic falling over board I don't see a problem, the main influx comes from few rivers (acc. to https://phys.org/news/2017-06-plasti...rce-ocean.html).

But anyway, vive la Multihullture ;-)

Understood, our 53 is over in Italy. Over the past six years, I flew there once in May then returned to the US in late October, unlike the OP who most likely went back and forth in less than two weeks. When I fly, I look for cheap unused seats at the last minute, unlike the OP who most likely scheduled his seats well in advance for his one week charter.

[250224]

Originally Posted by Kenomac

Understood, our 53 is over in Italy. Over the past six years, I flew there once in May then returned to the US in late October, unlike the OP who most likely went back and forth in less than two weeks. When I fly, I look for cheap unused seats at the last minute, unlike the OP who most likely scheduled his seats well in advance for his one week charter.

Thanks. And btw. I should have added a sorry. And I also think it was a bit unappropriate to make it personal.

[waterman46]

My 46 ft sailboat gets 5mpg. It is rare, in coastal cruising to have good sailing conditions over more than half the distances.. My F150 gets 15 mpg and this year I will probably motor the boat almost as far as I drive the truck. But the boat is 32 years old so I am basically using just a lot of recycled plastic all the time I sail.

All this shows is that the OP's comparison is impossible to quantify.

[tomfl]

[IMG][/IMG]

[serol1971]

Originally Posted by grantmc

I've created a PDF of the article for those that can't access it.

As an aside I think it's excellent but more importantly has drawn out some very fine posts indeed. Great discussion.

Yes indeed, great discussion. Thanks to all of you, for your valuable comments!

I want to emphasize that the article is not meant to give somebody a bad feeling about his impact. It has been motivated by my personal interest what quantities of emissions a typical sailing trip of one week causes to the environment. I centered my article around typical problem areas of yachting.

There have been some complaints as to what I compare the emissions. I did compare CO2 emissions between different scenarios of travel from and to the port, but did not do so for other emissions. I actually wanted to keep things short and exemplary. There are, as some of you stated, quite many possible scenarios. Further, I have only considered those emissions that are potentially harmful to the environment. Human excreta emitted in the sea, especially in enclosed areas, are definitely a problem, as has been scientifically proved. Human excreta in high volumes emitted to sea is not a natural process. Natural, if I may say so, is that humans poop on land and excreta then is treated in a technically controlled way and even increasingly reused for several purposes.

In general, we as humans and any other animal certainly have some kind of impact on the environment at any time of our life. This is a natural process. It is hard to judge whether a literal "footprint" has a negative or positive impact. Especially, when we take the dimension of time into account. Does it have an impact in the short term, medium term or long term? If it has no impact in the short term it does not mean necessarily mean that it is like that in the long term. And how much impact have footprints when there are 8 billions of them around?

But.. I think we as intelligent humans, somehow need to know which impact we have in all our doing to be able to make a difference. I think it is in the tradition of a westerly enlightened culture that from time to time we ask ourselves what we do here and try to seek new ways for the future. We need to do this in the small (on the individual level) but as well on the societal level.


And I love sailing! ;-)

[Tetepare]

Originally Posted by KimSails

the 12g of copper and other ablatives, while seemingly a small amount, seems interesting potentially thought provoking.

Again, all things considered, is it statistically material? In my area, farm nitrate runoff has caused an explosion in aquatic plant and algae growth. And, a significant problem is invasive mussles.The copper ablatives, if anything, help offset this.

[Mike OReilly]

Originally Posted by valhalla360

Actually, we are coming into balance in terms of population but as a long lived species, it takes several decades.

The overall population growth rate is plumeting. Most modernized economies have shrinking growth rates (without immigration). Even developing countries are fast approaching zero growth rates.

Projections are 50-75yrs from now the total population will be shrinking (even with growth rates negative, it takes a while before the population follows).

Now will we face challenges in the mean time? Sure but this change is occurring without significant contribution from war, disease or famine. It's also not due to anything the eco-faithful have told us about the evils of being alive.

It's simply individuals choosing to have fewer children...most can be traced back to economic incentives (the days of 8 kids so you had free farm labor are long gone).

In any discussion on the impact humanity is having, someone always raises the over-population problem. It is a problem, but it is one that is improving. As Val says population, while still increasing, has been doing so at a slower and slower rate, such that a peak can be seen. After that global population will come down, and all without any drastic or Malthusian efforts.

What isn’t coming down is the rate of resource usage those of us in the developed countries consume. THIS is the big problem, especially as more and more countries join the “developed” world.

As has been long noted, if everyone lived like us, we’d need multiple planets to sustain us all. This is why I say the only real solution to humanity’s contribution to environmental degradation is for those of us in the developed world to learn how to live with less.


Living on a smallish boat is one way of doing this. It’s not the only way, but it is a life that lends itself to smaller living.

[Kenomac]

Who's going to be the first in line to convert to Soylent Green? I doubt any serious eco-greenies will.

[cyan]

Originally Posted by Tetepare

Again, all things considered, is it statistically material? In my area, farm nitrate runoff has caused an explosion in aquatic plant and algae growth. And, a significant problem is invasive mussles.The copper ablatives, if anything, help offset this.

Some of these factors eclipse anything sailboats do.
A marina in my area has a breakwater that appears to be the favorite hangout for every other seal in the Pacific. The concentration of seal poop is awful, and many unsuccessful attempts have been made to address the issue. Nothing the nearby sailboats do could be this bad, according to human noses.

What did the humans do wrong? Well they built a nice rocky breakwater where only sand existed. Seals love these rocks, which have become Poop City. I can only imagine the comedy involved when someone tries to measure the pollution in the marina... on the cleaner side- the one away from the rocks, where the sailboats are parked.

[KimSails]

Originally Posted by Tetepare

Again, all things considered, is it statistically material? In my area, farm nitrate runoff has caused an explosion in aquatic plant and algae growth. And, a significant problem is invasive mussles.The copper ablatives, if anything, help offset this.

I am not a scientist. I don't know if it is statistically significant. But I wouldn't discount it just because of its small amount. Very small changes can have an outsize impact.

I live in Michigan in the United States, sailing the Great Lakes, like you. I know about the zebra mussels. And the mercury in the Great Lakes fish. And lead in the Flint, Michigan drinking water. Whether its freighter bilge water (zebra mussels), industrial mining and dumping (mercury) or a seemingly simple water source change (Flint), at one point in time people thought that their impact was not material.

Maybe the copper isn't material. I'm just saying that I wouldn't discount it just because it is a small amount.

[KimSails]

Originally Posted by Kenomac

Who's going to be the first in line to convert to Soylent Green? I doubt any serious eco-greenies will.

Soylent Green? That sounds interesting! I'm a Greenie and a vegetarian.

Soylent Green sounds great. What is it?