[HN Gopher] Unmanned submarine earmarked for Irish Sea freight c...
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Unmanned submarine earmarked for Irish Sea freight crossings
Author : hanoz
Score : 45 points
Date : 2021-09-15 12:10 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bbc.co.uk)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bbc.co.uk)
| tppiotrowski wrote:
| > A self-driving hydrogen-powered submarine is among the winners
| in a UK government competition to tackle emissions from shipping.
|
| > But what kind of cargo will the submarine be carrying? "That's
| what we're going to figure out over the next few months," he told
| the BBC's Good Morning Ulster programme.
|
| > The creators say it will also collect micro-plastic from the
| water column and feed the data to researchers.
|
| I think it's an interesting concept but selling it as a fix for
| emissions for shipping seems like greenwashing to me.
| munk-a wrote:
| Additionally, unless I'm missing something, we don't actually
| have the economics at scale to produce "green hydrogen" right
| now - it's definitely cleaner than oil, but it's still rather
| environmentally expensive to produce.
| ZeroGravitas wrote:
| It's not evironmentally expensive, but it is currently money
| expensive due to a combination of implicit subsidies of the
| fossil fuel industry and small scale of production.
| belorn wrote:
| It not that crazy concept for an actually functional drone
| delivery system. Ocean based wind farms that generate green
| hydrogen has been suggested as a possible future method to
| solve the grid stability issue in a future without fossil fuels
| (especially in the camp that would rather use fossil fuels than
| nuclear). If you are already producing the hydrogen in the
| ocean, having a delivery system of drones that operate on
| hydrogen and can travel independently to those wind farms to
| refuel seems like a good match.
|
| This assuming that the cost of building the green hydrogen
| producing wind farm near the ports, the cost of the drones, the
| control systems and loading/offloading can be competitive to
| simply using very large ships that burn cheap fossil fuel.
| kitd wrote:
| AIUI, GPS doesnt penetrate very far below the ocean surface. It
| would be interesting to know what alternatives they are planning
| for navigation.
| cyberge99 wrote:
| Some auv's have a (retractable) tether to a surface GPS. I'm
| not sure about this one though.
| usrusr wrote:
| Simple: put the receiver on the tractor kite. I mean, what
| self-respecting future green sea transport solution wouldn't
| have a huge tractor kite?
|
| And what would be more impressive than a huge tractor kite? A
| huge tractor kite on a tether that dives 50m beneath the
| surface.
| munk-a wrote:
| Having something extending above the surface would help
| with visibility for small ships as well - cargo vessels
| will track this automatically and most modestly sized
| sailboats do either have a built in unit for tracking
| nearby ships or folks just use their smartphones - but for
| really small water craft (like rowboats/dingies and
| personal sail-craft (sunfishes)) I'm concerned that
| collisions would be extremely easy.
| siod wrote:
| I love the concept of submarine cargo ships but there are three
| main issues that make them less appealing than ships.
|
| Subs require significantly more thrust per cubic metre of cargo.
|
| Communication and navigation are more difficult because GPS and
| satellite comms don't work underwater.
|
| Loading and unloading in comparable times to a standard container
| vessel.
| jhgb wrote:
| Surely a GPS mast shouldn't be a problem? And an IMU may be
| more expensive than a GPS receiver, but compared to the cost of
| the whole vessel, it's probably negligible.
| tgb wrote:
| Doppler velocity log is likely what they'd want.
| [deleted]
| siod wrote:
| Yeah a mast or tethered transmitter probably they way to go,
| but now you have the problem of operating both a submarine
| and a pseudo surface vessel.
|
| Nothing insurmountable, but it's not as simple as running
| under everyone which is what the article implied (to me
| atleast).
| lowestprimate wrote:
| One of the reasons to use quantum gyroscopes is that will be
| accurate to within 1m or so after a day long underwater
| traverse of 1000 km or more. Communication while fully under
| still sucks though.
| BoxOfRain wrote:
| >Communication and navigation are more difficult because GPS
| and satellite comms don't work underwater.
|
| That's a really good point, how do you get a signal to a
| submerged unmanned submarine under all that conductive
| saltwater? Military submarines use VLF radio waves that can
| penetrate saltwater fairly deep, but those long wavelengths
| require enormous aerials and powerful transmitters that are one
| thing if you're the navy of a nuclear power, quite another if
| you're a shipping line looking to make a profit.
| newsclues wrote:
| Less turbulence to move the cargo, which could lead to less
| breakage.
|
| If subs are designed for cargo then unload/loading operations
| can be optimized.
| munk-a wrote:
| Deep water subs require serious fixed reinforcement (like
| gigantic periodic rings) to prevent being crushed at low
| depths that would stop you from easily exposing the interior
| for unloading - but given that they're only going 50m deep
| I'm sure you could have some mechanism to pop the sub in half
| and get all the access you need. I feel like turbulence is
| sort of a solved problem by way of pallet packing - but that
| actually raises a larger concern of mine - the sub they
| display is pretty tube-shaped which means it's either not
| going to use pre-packed pallets (definitely the case if the
| image shown is to scale) or it's not going to use pre-packed
| pallets efficiently. Habours leverage pallets to minimize the
| manual labour needed for loading/unloading so while the ship
| might open like a sardine can it's not going to see a lot of
| use if someone needs to lift boxes out of it one at a time.
| wheybags wrote:
| PS380,000 seems like... a drop in the ocean for a project like
| that. Surely they will need multiple millions just to have a
| chance at commercial success.
| Ekaros wrote:
| In general that isn't much in submarine business... Even used
| reasonably sized tourist submarines cost more. And those have
| very limited dive times ranges.
| ryankupyn wrote:
| This is an intriguing concept, but given that the submarine is
| small and suitable for mostly high-value cargo (whisky is the
| example cargo given in the article) I'm not sure how it'll offer
| significant advantages over other forms of transportation in
| practice.
|
| Although submarines are more effective navigating through storms,
| one could simply wait for the storm to pass when shipping non-
| time-sensitive cargo, then use a regular surface cargo ship
| (which could be automated if desired just like the submarine).
| Surface ships also have the advantage of compatibility with our
| already-established shipbuilding and maintenance infrastructure,
| while a submarine would require the proliferation of new skills
| and tools to support it.
|
| For time-critical cargo (where one can't wait for a hypothetical
| storm to pass), it's likely aircraft would be a better option for
| most shipments - certainly in severe storms aircraft can't
| operate either, but in that case the very act of loading and
| unloading the submarine would be hazardous as well.
| jcun4128 wrote:
| That's neat imagine a heist to catch one underwater with a net
| themodelplumber wrote:
| _Modern cargo submarines: Born out of, and into, criminality._
|
| I agree and would love to see some capers like that. Even if
| tongue in cheek, like an Ocean's 12-style billionaire who lives
| in a customized one because they suffer from severe OCD and
| introversion or something. Everybody on the squad rolls their
| eyes and the audience rolls the eyes right along with them,
| because nope, we're not sensitive billionaire techie weirdos
| here! Just good ol' fashioned types.
|
| (Meanwhile, Wolfram is probably literally trying out one for
| off-site workplace-hacking IRL, or something stranger than
| fiction...)
| serf wrote:
| I like the idea, but as a mariner who has ran into mysterious
| things in the sea i'm more ambiguous.
|
| one of the major advantages of (most) ocean-going vessels, aside
| from usually having a crew aboard to negotiate with over VHF as
| to who goes where when trying to navigate around them , is that
| the above-water visibility aids in navigation and avoidance.
|
| a future where trade channels are filled with AI-driven low-depth
| submarines that have no real crew aboard to communicate with sort
| of worries me, but all I can do is hope that the people who put
| them together and control them get it right -- otherwise it could
| turn a lot of trips dangerous.
|
| for those that are in the business : is there an established
| method by which these unmanned ships that I keep reading about
| deal with VHF traffic of those around them? Perhaps the ship is
| receiving and sending back to some proxy site somewhere for a
| crew to communicate to nearby ships offsite?
| robotresearcher wrote:
| The article is not clearly written, but they say these things:
|
| 1. it will run at 50m depth in trade routes
|
| 2. it can work in shallow waters where container ship can not
|
| So I think the idea is that it does not need deep-water port
| infrastructure, but will get deep and out of the way when it's
| out of port. So a big ship would never see it.
|
| And it can potentially go under the polar ice.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| They'll be out of the way of surface ships.
|
| But how will they be out of the way of each other?
|
| Solvable problem, but not without some complexity.
| nradov wrote:
| It will run at 50m depth until something breaks and it loses
| depth keeping control with no one on board to effect repairs.
| oh_sigh wrote:
| Does that make it any different from the millions of pieces
| of flotsam/jetsam all over the ocean?
| topynate wrote:
| So what? It's unmanned. Worst case it sinks and the
| shipment is lost. By default it surfaces and waits for
| someone to come fix it.
| nradov wrote:
| Worst case it surfaces without power and another vessel
| runs into it. Hitting a lost shipping container is bad
| enough. Hitting a submarine is likely to be worse since
| they're structurally much stronger.
|
| Getting a tow line onto that thing is going to be
| hazardous in any kind of rough weather. As often happens
| in the Irish Sea.
| munk-a wrote:
| I think they'd need some serious lane marking around wherever
| they're going to come to surface (unless they somehow intend
| for these to surface vertically within a reception depot). I
| can imagine how "fun" it'd be to be in a teensy sailboat (like
| a sunfish) and have this thing surface under you - possibly
| chucking you into the sub's engine when you're thrown from the
| boat.
| contingencies wrote:
| I have been on a small sailboat and had a submarine surface
| nearby. Good times!
| anonymousDan wrote:
| Wow, do you think they knew you were there? Must have been
| a shock!
| oh_sigh wrote:
| Probably not, considering even advanced nuclear subs just
| pop up without checking if there is a 200' ship above
| them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ehime_Maru_and_USS_Gr
| eeneville...
| hodgesrm wrote:
| Seems to open up a new variation on "boat hitting whale"
| accidents only a lot more damaging to the boat. It's already
| bad for the whale.
| secfirstmd wrote:
| I'm curious. What sort of mysterious things have you run into?
| Narco stuff? Military? Little Green Men?
| glitchcrab wrote:
| I suspect the GP used 'run into' in the literal sense i.e.
| hiring submerged objects. There's a surprising amount of crap
| floating around out there from small logs right up to lost
| shipping containers. If you sail enough then it's an
| occupational hazard (and an extremely dangerous one if you're
| in a smaller boat).
| amelius wrote:
| > lost shipping containers
|
| Reminds me of:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_Is_Lost
| oaiey wrote:
| UK sponsored, in the Irish sea? Is the UK smuggling stuff over to
| northern Ireland to circumstance the EU Brexit treaty?
| tehbeard wrote:
| It's a comedy act by Bojo the clown (Boris Johnson) and co...
|
| To distract the public from the various shitshows currently
| going on with absolutely daft crap, like this and the "return
| of imperial measurements"..
| Aspos wrote:
| There is a whole industry ready to throw money at a vehicle which
| does not need humans to operate, can evade detection, can be
| cheap enough to be discarded after transporting a highly valuable
| cargo.
| sdoering wrote:
| This industry is already employing subs albeit with people
| aboard [1].
|
| [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narco-submarine?wprov=sfla1
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| I have to say, I'm amused by the strength of the pearl-
| clutching impulse illustrated by the wikipedia intro:
|
| > Some express concerns such vessels could potentially be
| used for purposes other than smuggling.
|
| I guess "but what if it facilitates the drug trade?" just
| wasn't available as an objection here.
| tgb wrote:
| There are "underwater gliders" that propel themselves by
| ascending/descending via changing their buoyancy and using fins
| to direct this forwards. They have low speed but are much more
| efficient than most subs. Would be interesting to see such a
| glider take on freight, though it would probably need thrusters
| for navigation in harbor.
| throwoutway wrote:
| > though it would probably need thrusters for navigation in
| harbor.
|
| Perhaps the harbor can have small tugboats that simply hook the
| freighters and push it into the harbor
| todd8 wrote:
| As I recall from my class work in a hydrospace vehicles course I
| took decades ago, submarines have the interesting property of
| being more efficient that surface vehicle because they leave no
| wake. A wake is a set of propagating waves that require energy to
| generate and this, naturally, is felt as drag by conventional
| ships.
|
| The question of course arises, why aren't submarines used for
| shipping? We were taught that the problem was buoyancy control.
| The weight of a ship carrying freight can vary greatly on a round
| trip.
| jareklupinski wrote:
| I can imagine loading and unloading a sub full of containers to
| be more difficult than an open-top cargo ship
| HomeDeLaPot wrote:
| That's surprising to me... is it because handling the variance
| in buoyancy would require massive ballast tanks? I was thinking
| the primary blocker would be the sheer complexity and cost of
| the technology required to go _under_ the water rather than
| _on_ it for a long period of time.
| thaumasiotes wrote:
| > submarines have the interesting property of being more
| efficient that surface vehicle because they leave no wake. A
| wake is a set of propagating waves that require energy to
| generate and this, naturally, is felt as drag by conventional
| ships.
|
| This sounds off. Conventional ships experience drag when they
| try to go forward and there's a bunch of water in the way. When
| they shove that water out of the way, it has to go somewhere
| else, and meanwhile some other water has to flow into the space
| where the ship used to be. That motion of the water generates
| the wake.
|
| But all of that applies just as well to submarines moving below
| the surface of the sea, or cars driving around within the
| atmosphere. If a car passes by you, you'll feel wind blowing
| after it. That is the car's wake. And when a submarine tries to
| move underwater, it runs into _exactly the same problem_ as the
| surface ship -- there 's a bunch of water in the way. How can
| it possibly move without generating a wake?
| Someone wrote:
| It sounds off, but is true, but at least partially because
| the hull of modern submarines is optimized for submerged use.
|
| That's why the bow of modern submarines looks more like the
| nosecone of a rocket than like the bow of a surface vessel.
|
| See https://navalpost.com/submarine-cavitation-drag-
| underwater-s...)
| Ekaros wrote:
| I wonder if there is some scaling factor here. That is in
| certain range submarines are more efficient. But then if you
| get big enough normal cargo ships do better. I would think that
| surface area plays big part, with big ships only certain area
| is under water, for submarines it's the whole thing. And for
| cargo ships it start to be big.
| wefarrell wrote:
| A clandestine means of transporting cargo without relying on
| humans who can steal or be traced back to the owner. I wonder if
| they'll accept cryptocurrency.
| ajay-b wrote:
| The future of shipping will be autonomous. It will end the
| horrible labor abuses, and quite possibly halt piracy. However it
| would require trust. An autonomous ship could just has easily be
| a Trojan horse!
| knodi123 wrote:
| > quite possibly halt piracy
|
| ?!? Anything you could do to keep an unmanned ship from being
| robbed, you could do to a manned ship too.
|
| > autonomous ship could just has easily be a Trojan horse!
|
| ?!? A manned ship could be a Trojan Horse too, in much the same
| way that the actual horse in the legend was.
| wahern wrote:
| I doubt the most abusive shippers will switch to autonomous
| shipping anytime soon. Rather, reductions in labor will attract
| the more responsible, better paying shippers that some global
| communities (e.g. in the Philippines) heavily rely upon for
| income. Because being responsible is expensive; automation
| replaces employees, not slaves.
| athenot wrote:
| Sounds interesting but the article doesn't mention how many
| containers would fit in this sub.
| themodelplumber wrote:
| Based on the illustration, easily hundreds.
|
| Based on the model sitting on a wooden table, none.
| munk-a wrote:
| How are you deriving a sense of scale from the illustration?
| I am got no grip on the intended size based on that image -
| it could be the side of rhode island - or small enough to fit
| in a coffee mug.
| asdff wrote:
| Oh my god that model
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