The world’s first foiling boat that can produce clean hydrogen gas has been unveiled by the British start-up firm, Drift Energy.

A propeller underneath the 18ft yacht drives a turbine which produces electricity to power an electrolyzer, which splits water into hydrogen and water.

The clean hydrogen is then stored in a Department of Transport-verified compressed tank. The only by-product is oxygen, which is vented.

The CEO of Drift Energy, Ben Medland, says although drag is usually minimised on foiling yachts to allow them to reach higher speeds, the drag of the turbine is needed to power it.

‘The engineering involved in America’s Cup racing has meant boats are able to go faster and faster. Rather than using that power to go as fast as possible around a race course, we’re sacrificing a couple of extra knots of speed, but that’s power that we can harness. So we’re using that phenomenon of apparent wind sailing to get to higher power outputs, but then using the drag to generate the energy on the boat, which can still reach speeds to foil,’ he explained.

During sea trails off Brightlingsea in Essex, the yacht reached speeds of up to 25 knots, filling a six litre tank with clean hydrogen within two hours.

The yacht was originally made by White Formula before it was converted to produce clean hydrogen. Credit: Drift Energy

Medland said the yacht represents a ‘new class of mobile renewable energy‘, with boats delivering ‘meaningful volumes of clean hydrogen into the hydrogen economy in any port, anywhere in the globe.’

Unlike wind farms, the boats are not static and can be routed anywhere to sail in optimum wind conditions.

Drift Energy has worked with the Artificial intelligence firm Faculty to create a routing algorithm, so yachts can continually be sailed on the most optimum course.

Continues below…