Electric RIBs driving sustainability at Youth Sailing World Championships

Electric RIBs driving sustainability at Youth Sailing World Championships © World Sailing

A new innovation on Lake Garda's 29er racecourse at the Youth Sailing World Championships will be the first of its kind showcased at a World Sailing event.

Based at the Circolo Vela Arco club and led by Michele 'Mike' Giorgini and VSR RIBs, the 29er class at the event will be accompanied by all-electric rigid inflatable boats (RIBs) for the first time in its history.

Lake Garda, a sacred place for sailing and world-renowned for its katabatic winds (winds carrying high-density air from mountains towering over the lake) has long forbidden normal engines in the north part of the lake but electric RIBs could be a coaching game-changer, starting with the 29er class.

The project is still in its early stages but the potential of the technology used on the water could be significant for generations of sailors and coaches to come.

"Knowing that we offered to launch the idea to try to see if these RIBs can manage the racecourse because we know that sustainability is a measuring point of this event," Giorgini said.

"It's an experiment but we are ready for everything and, on the other hand, we are already coaching squads since the end of March and organised a couple of races using two electric RIBs.

"We didn't have any issues so we said let's try to do it."

Giorgini, who lived in Trentino for eight years before moving to Trieste, is already a recognisable name within the area and the sport.

He was a strong sailor in his own right before going on to coach Olympic champions Ruggero Tita and Caterina Banti.

With more than 30 years of coaching experience under his belt, Giorgini is honing his experience by helping to make sailing even more sustainable in fresh water and beyond.

His ultimate aim is to power the batteries of the RIBs through photovoltaic implants, which CVA have already started to install into their club.

"We are really trusting in this and think this could be the future," he said. "We work in cooperation with electric engineers and battery builders because we should not underestimate that the battery is a critical part in this whole project.

"Putting everything together, in a couple of years the goal is to be able to power everything with our own photovoltaic implants, so no fossil fuel is involved at all.

"The energy will be pure energy and we will have more pollution in the Lake."

Giorgini's efforts align with World Sailing's World Sailing's Sustainability Agenda 2030, which supports both the International Olympic Committee's Sustainability Strategy and the commitment to contribute to the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

From a longer lens, Giorgini believes proving electric RIBs can contend with racing conditions will be a major step in its future development and reducing the overall use of fossil fuels.

"All around, everyone is now excited for this testing to be done," he said. "It's something born from nothing, we just launched the idea and everyone was interested in it so we decided to do it.

"We felt it was something we had to do, we can't set goals for other people, everyone has to realise that we cannot go on trashing the energy like we do right now.

"I have been tracking the numbers for two years in every single coaching session and we are well over 80% efficiency."