Sustainable shipping: are auxiliary sails a solution?

90% of everything around you is transported by cargo vessels. So it's not surprising that shipping is responsible for 3% of global C02 emissions. This needs to become more sustainable. That's why TU Delft is launching a new research programme on 31 October to explore the possibilities of wind-assisted propulsion for cargo vessels. The aim is to reduce fuel consumption by 30%. 'In this research programme, we're actually going back to the classic notion of a sail,' says Albert Rijkens, coordinator of the project. In other words, the wind is not used to generate energy, but to propel the ship directly.