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I am sure you haven’t heard about this yet.

Earthrace, a weird looking, “wave piercing trimaran”, a.k.a. a boat, will try to set the world record for circumnavigating the globe by powerboat (current record 74 days, 23 hours and 53 minutes, they’re shooting for 65 days). The catch? Earthrace will handcuff itself, Houdini style, “by running on exclusively 100% Biodiesel fuel, and with a net zero carbon footprint. Admirable goals, you might say… let’s look closer. Biodiesel fuel, while not uncommon anymore, is also not widely available. “The voyage includes twelve refueling stops at various ports around the globe. For around half of them, we are linking in with existing biodiesel producers and marketers who are sponsoring fuel. For the others however, such as Majuro (Marshall Islands), Koror (Palau) and Panama, we are shipping fuel which will be ready at the dock when we arrive.” Let me get this straight, Earthrace will guzzle over 7,000+ gallons of 100% Biodiesel fuel ($3.50/gallon x 7,000 gallons = $24,500) and leave no carbon footprint? As far as I can find, biodiesel is 74% cleaner than regular diesel. So what about the other 26%? And how exactly is the 3,500+ gallons getting to the Marshall Islands, Palau and Panama? The Gossamer Albatross? My guess regular tanker boats and trunks running regular diesel. Not to mention all the “volunteers” and support crew traveling in their cars, boats and planes to assist in the journey. That’s a lot of “zero carbon footprint” in the name of saving the earth. Nice scam guys.

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