Wind Power for Ships

KiteShip Corporation of Alameda (San Francisco, USA) is hoping to harness wind power in a way that could change cargo shipping. It's a new twist on a very old technology. There's nothing new about wind power. But there is something very new about the big plans to harness much more of that power. The company has recently arranged a huge kite demonstration to promote this form of wind power. Company executives say it can reduce cargo ship fuel consumption by 10-25 percent, which would be very substantial savings.

KiteShip hopes its next experiment will allow it to make headlines by engineering a 13,000 square foot kite to co-power vessels up to 600 feet in length saving $300,000 dollars in fuel per year, per vessel. It seems it's not a matter of if but when for this technology -- companies in Europe and Asia are all working on this technology. KiteShip says the future is near - that those huge kites will be helping to haul huge cargo ships in three to five years.