Loading playerLast May 20 near the National Maritime Museum in Amsterdam, in the Netherlands, a particular boat was seen, which seemed to have come out of another time compared to the reproduction of the seventeenth-century ship East Indiaman, moored in the dock in front of the exhibition space : it was a prototype of a driverless electric boat, perfected by the Amsterdam Institute for Advanced Metropolitan Solutions (AMS) in collaboration with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) of the United States.
Boats have always been one of the most popular means of transport in the Netherlands, and especially in a city like Amsterdam, which has more than 100 kilometers of canals. For the local administration, developing and encouraging the use of electric boats, with or without a driver, is a good strategy to reduce traffic in the city, but above all an opportunity to reduce the pollution produced by tourist boats, which are one of the main attractions of the city and they travel up to 14 hours a day.
For some time now, in the Netherlands, as well as in Denmark and other countries, several models and prototypes of electric boats have begun to appear. At the same time, the transformation of diesel-fueled tourist boats into electric vehicles began in Amsterdam: such as the Gerarda Johanna, a boat from 1922 that hides 66 lithium batteries that power its propeller under its classic wooden panels.
The Gerarda Johanna has a dedicated mooring and charging station on a canal in the city, but the prototypes of the Roboat project of the AMS Institute and MIT, which takes its name from the fusion of the word “robot” with the English term that indicates a ' boat, “boat”, have an even more ambitious goal: to navigate the waters of the whole world without the need to be guided by man.
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The prototypes of the Roboat project have four engines powered by an electric battery: they travel at a maximum speed of 6 kilometers per hour and have an autonomy of 12 to 24 hours, depending on the type of battery fitted and the weight of the load carried.
They are remotely controlled by a computer that collects and processes the characteristics of the space around the vehicles through sensors and cameras, which also serve to observe the movement of other boats. They are equipped with special mechanisms that are used to manage mooring and docking and in addition they have some modular elements that can be adapted to the transport of people or the transport of goods or waste, something that makes them even more versatile: they can carry up to 5 passengers or up to 1500 kilos of materials. What was recently seen in front of the National Maritime Museum is the first prototype made in full size.
Stephan van Dijk, director of the Innovation branch of the AMS Institute, explained to the Associated Press that the use of sophisticated technologies is essential not only to make the prototype travel independently, but above all to ensure that the boat can juggle with ease. in the heavy traffic of the canals of Amsterdam, where maneuvers and docking operations are made more complicated by the presence of many boats and numerous piers and docks.
According to mechatronic engineer Rens Doornbusch, a member of the team working on the project, it will take 2 to 4 years to perfect the maneuvering technologies, mostly because the Institute wants to be “absolutely certain” that the boat can navigate in all safety. Doornbusch said that as far as autonomy is concerned, the goal has been achieved and that now the next step is to “teach” the Roboats to handle any kind of situation that might arise in the canals.
Before the prototypes can actually go into operation, in any case, it will also be necessary to clarify various bureaucratic issues, both in terms of permissions and in terms of privacy. Van Dijk said the researchers are collaborating with various Dutch ministries to ensure that the boats can move independently and also to regulate the use of cameras and sensors. He added that the cameras mounted on the Roboat do not identify people walking on the street or aboard other boats.
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Encouraging the development and circulation of electric vehicles is part of the initiative to ban the transit of diesel-fueled vehicles in the city center by 2025, a proposal launched in 2019 by the Amsterdam administration, led by the Greens. The initiative would serve above all to reduce the pollution produced by vehicles, both cars and boats, in an attempt to achieve the goals set internationally to combat global warming.
According to the data provided by the city administration, three quarters of the approximately 550 commercial boats that sail in the city's waters have already been transformed into electric vehicles and can therefore be considered to be “zero emissions”. For example, the owner of Gerarda Johanna, Rererij Kooij, is transforming his company's boats one by one as they need maintenance (as of last March he had modified 13 out of 29).
The big problem are private boats, which according to the city administration are about 12 thousand and 95 per cent are still fueled by diesel. Transforming existing boats into electric vehicles can cost from 4 thousand to 40 thousand euros, depending on the size, but it is likely that with future bans many boat owners will decide to sell them. To incentivize the transformation of boats into electric vehicles, or in any case to facilitate their use, the administration of Amsterdam has planned to install 100 new charging stations along the city's canals in the coming months.
