March 14th, 2008

By John DeFore

Generating power from the sea isn’t a new idea — “wave farms” are being planned around the world, hoping to transform the kinetic energy of waves into electricity. But using waves to power a boat is pretty novel, according to the adventurer who’s about to tackle an ambitious one-man voyage using nothing but the sea’s own power.

Next weekend, Kenichi Horie will set out to travel the roughly 6,000 kilometers (3,700 miles) between Hawaii and Nishinomiya Yacht Harbor in Japan — serving as the entire crew of the Suntory Mermaid II, the latest in a pioneering family of vessels to bear that name.

After making similar voyages in solar and human-powered ships — made from materials like recycled beer kegs, aluminum cans, and whiskey barrels (leading one to wonder if Horie’s projects started life as bar bets) — he takes this trip in a boat whose spring-driven propulsion system is briefly explained in this Popular Science article.

As the system’s designer Yutaka Terao told the magazine, “waves are a negative factor for a ship — they slow it down,” but this one channels natural rocking action to a pair of dolphin-like fins that push the Mermaid forward. Horie, who hopes that his achievement will spur builders of enormous cargo ships to consider this non-polluting alternative propulsion, arrived with his latest cruiser in Honolulu early this month. If all goes well, he’ll launch Sunday for a voyage expected to last between two and three months. (And no, he won’t be using the boat’s sails.)

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