It was a cold April morning about 30 years ago when I got my first taste of electric boating. My roommate at the time, a licensed captain, had been hired to take an electric launch from Annapolis, Md., to Castle Harbor Marina on the Eastern Shore. He invited me along for what was planned as an easy, three-hour run at the boat’s cruising speed of 6 knots.

Or so we thought.

Of course, being diligent, experienced skippers with oodles of miles under our collective keels, we had the forethought to plug the boat into shore power the previous day to ensure a full charge for the voyage. We tossed off the dock lines at 5:30 a.m. under a cool fog with the idea of grabbing a piping-hot pancake breakfast on the other side, and a quick and easy delivery fee for my roommate.

Gliding along under virtually silent power, we didn’t think until we passed beneath the twin Chesapeake Bay Bridge spans to look at the current state of the battery bank. “Uh oh,” my friend said. “That’s really bad.”

With about 6 miles to go to the marina, the batteries had slipped to just above 12 volts and were falling fast against a 3-knot ebb. As we rounded Love Point into the Chester River, we crawled along at only a couple of knots. Half an hour later, having depleted the batteries, we broke out the paddles. (At least we thought to bring those.) We must have looked pathetic out there because a waterfront homeowner soon motored out to help us.

Thankfully, that kind man towed us to the marina safe and sound. Only our sore arms reminded us of the haphazard trip as we tucked into a comforting, syrup-soaked breakfast. We were home by noon, no worse for wear.

I was reminded of this trip as the Soundings Trade Only team put together this issue, which focuses on climate, the environment and sustainability. Back in the early 1990s, an electric boat was more of a novelty than an intentional way to reduce one’s carbon footprint, and the baked-in technology was entirely analog — a bank of old-tech, lead-acid batteries and a voltmeter.

Obviously, things are much different today. Electric boats fly on foils controlled by on-board computers. These boats are packed with technology that monitors and conveys minute details about battery health, range and much more. While the jury is still out on whether there are enough use cases for electric propulsion on recreational boats, the latest technology has made the experience of electric boat ownership much friendlier — and, some say, made boating itself much less damaging to the environment.

That type of technology is far from the only one our industry is now employing with an eye toward climate, the environment and sustainability. As you thumb through this issue, you’ll learn how supercomputers and advanced weather modeling helped experts at the National Hurricane Center tell us what sort of storm activity we should expect this season. Additionally, you’ll see how tech is being used to predict storm surge levels and to better prepare industry stakeholders and the general boating public when danger looms. You can read about their predictions, as well as the lessons learned from Hurricane Ian last year, in senior editor Eric Colby’s excellent reporting on Page 26.

Technology is also offering alternatives to a proposal by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration that would limit boats as small as 35 feet to speeds of 10 knots or less during much of the prime boating season, in a stated effort to reduce vessel collisions with North Atlantic right whales. Advanced radar, acoustic tracking and other technology might reduce the few strikes that do occur, and possibly eliminate the need for the restrictions altogether. Chris Dixon, senior editor at our sister publication, Power & Motoryacht, provides a detailed examination of that issue on Page 30.

Also this month, Alan Jones teaches us a lot about creating a more sustainable end-of-life solution for fiberglass boats. In his “Getting Technical” column, he writes about Arkema’s Elium recyclable resin. Beneteau and Boston Whaler are using Elium for specific applications that someday may lead to its widespread use in boatbuilding. The resin is engineered to be broken down into its base components at the end of a boat’s useful life, a far cry from the dumpster-to-landfill model currently employed for disposal.

I’m proud of the recreational marine industry for trying to come up with solutions to these and so many other problems. We are helping to lead the way when it comes to solving environmental problems with technological advances. 

This article was originally published in the July 2023 issue.