The electric ferry, or the charging infrastructure?
This is what is known as putting the cart before the horse.
Projects need to be done in a certain order, but that doesn't give politicians the splashy PR that they like.
The city of Auckland, in New Zealand, bought some electric and some hybrid ferries, for their waterways. There is just 1 problem. The bought the ferries, but the charging infrastructure is still in the early stages of construction.
The electric ferry is just stuck. The hybrid ferry (ferries?) run around at night, doing pointless circles, to charge the batteries.
Well done Auckland!
Personally I wouldn't ride on an electric ferry, because the risk of fire at sea is bad enough, without adding in a giant lithium-ion battery. Even if it doesn't start the fire, if any of those batteries go into thermal runaway, it is going to be bad.
This is the MGUY Australia video You won't BELIEVE this ridiculous ELECTRIC ferry FIASCO!
So, it's not surprising that in the net zero adult minds of ferry companies, they do the easy bit first and put off the hard part till later. They buy the shiny new electric ferries to signal their environmental virtue and then put off worrying about the charging problems until another day.
But soon enough that day will come and they will discover that installing multi-megawatt charging facilities is both A) complex and B) eyewateringly expensive.
That is before the difference in cost of an electric versus a diesel ferry is calculated. The video is about 11 minutes.
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