This article was written by Robert Van Tol, Executive Director of the Water Revolution Foundation, for the SuperYacht Times Newspaper, Issue 42.

“It’s an oxymoron” is the common reaction to the claims around combining sustainability and yachting. Well, what shall we say, it is until it is not? There are plenty of examples of client-driven projects, not only from recent years, that pushed boundaries, including on efficiency and reducing environmental impact.It is true, however, that having a negative impact on what you want to explore – the ocean – makes no sense at all. If it is indeed the ocean that the yachting community wants to enjoy, it must be more than the owners alone who push the boundaries. We must push past this one-way relationship and take care of the ocean like no other, from every level of the industry. True stewardship!

But how? That is the most common question Water Revolution receives from the industry, and the goal to answer it is the reason the Foundation was initiated in 2018. By following a scientific approach, and successfully implementing it into the yachting sector, we can coordinate our efforts and work together in the same (and right!) direction. But this remains a challenge, several well-intentioned but insufficiently managed initiatives blur the direction that we need to go, scattering the sector, taking up resources and making false claims on what sustainability is and what initiatives are sufficient in order to claim…