This week a new sailing barge was launched on Lake Champlain that its backers hope will soon be in the vanguard of a new carbon-neutral shipping alternative. Volunteers with the Vermont Sail Freight Project built a 39 foot cargo vessel of the type that once plied the inland waterways throughout the northeastern. Like them, the Ceres will sail without any sort of motorized assistance.
Carbon-neutral boats can be a viable shipping method for the 21st century, connecting small-scale farmers in Vermont and upstate New York with customers along the Hudson River south to New York City — all while reducing the emissions that come from conventional shipping by trucks.
(READ the story from the Yale Environment blog)