Country of contradictions: Suriname

A banner with the works: Together we can make it, Yes we can!

We entered Suriname and saw sharp divisions in the water, probably differences in the currents of river water and oceanwater. And we found many more controversies in Suriname.

The sea before Suriname consist of the fresh water from the river (right) and the salt sea water.

Since 2014, Suriname is one of the three countries in the world with a net-negative carbon economy. They absorb more greenhouse gases than they emit from human activities.This negative carbon output is easy to explain. Only half a million people live in Suriname. 90% of Suriname’s human activity is on the coastal strip of 30 kilometer. The other hundreds of kilometres are jungle, rainforest, which capture carbon.

*The capital of Suriname, Paramaribo, looks like a Dutch town. Not only in the architecture of some of the characteristic buildings, but also in its setting: it is built almost on sea water level*

Carbon negative, but necessary carbon productivity

Like we saw in Gambia, also Suriname is particularly vulnerable to sea level rise and salt water intrusion.^[11] , because nearly all people live in the low lying coastal strip.

Agriculture and mining are the main sources of income. Agriculture contributes the largest part of the country’s emissions.^[2], the mining is the next. The country is covered by forests, mainly pristine rainforest, which absorb the CO2. This annually absorbs 8.8 million tons of carbon, while providing annual emissions of 7 million tons of carbon

While Suriname is rightfully proud of its carbon negative status, it badly needs the income from mining: formerly bauxite, now oil and gold. Petroleum exports are an important part of the economy of Suriname,^[7] much of which is controlled by the state owned Staatsolie Maatschappij Suriname. As of January 2020, an American corporation, Apache Corporation, was drilling wells in Maka Central.^[8]Unfortunately, mining can do great harm to the rainforest.

The Afobaka dam with the hydro energy, producing most of Surinams electricity (*source*)

Unfortunately, the building of the dam came with negative side-effects. The original inhabitants, the Samarakans (Marrons) were forced to move, the wood in their forest was cut and they suffered a great deal from all of this.

Suriname has an important source of reneweable energy: hydroelectric energy. In the 1960s, the Aluminum Company of America (Alcoa) built the US$150-million Afobaka Dam^[16] . This created the Brokopondo Reservoir a 1,560 km² lake, one of the largest artificial lakes in the world. Some 75% of the hydroelectric energy in the country was used for alumina and aluminium.(source). After the shutdown of Alcoa, Suriname became the owner of the Dam and hydroenergy now supplies the major part of the countries’ electricity (source)

*Electricity cables dominate the main roads in Paramaribo*.

Rich country, poor people

They say here: “You put your walking stick in the soil and next year there are branches and leaves on it”. That is the fertility. But the country is also rich in minerals. In 1990, the UN ranked Surinam as potentially the 17^th richest countries of the world. On the other hand, the UN in 2018 predicted that in 2030 Surinam would be one of the poorest countries of the world pro capita.(source) This would probably be caused by the budget deficit, caused mainly by debts and the great number of governmental employees (source).

Now, Suriname is a low-income country indeed. Most people earn 260 to 400 Euro per month and prices of living are relatively high. In 2018 20% of the people lived under the poverty limit. With COVID, GDP dropped 15%. Like most of the Caribbean states. As a matter of fact, it goes for most of the developing countries who are at risk of flooding with climate change.

No contribution to climate change, but victim of the consequenses

Surinams contributions to global climate change have been limited. But now, climate change leads to warmer temperatures and more extreme weather events. Noel, the owner of the Marina, tells us that schools in the south of the country have been closed in recent months due to flooding.

According to the World Bank, temperatures have already increased across the country, with a significant increase in hot weather.^[9] A large part of the rainforest may disappear because of the changes in rain and temperature.^[10]

Koppen-Geiger climate map for 1980-2016 (*(left)* *and for 2071-2100right). There will be less tropical rainforest, more monsoon climate and even some savannah in the south.*

The future: long term or short term?

Suriname is in a constant balancing act in relation to sustainability. And it is aware of this.

*Positive signpost with the ruins of the past in the background, Paramaribo, march 2022*.

In 2020 Suriname updated the Nationally Determined Contributions focus on four key areas; forests, electricity, agriculture and transport. Suriname wants to hold on to 93 per cent forest cover but needs “significant international support… for the conservation of this valuable resource in perpetuity.”

Sustainable and “clean” electricity is also a priority; Suriname strives for a “share of electricity from renewable sources above 35% by 2030.”

Agriculture is the cause of 40 per cent of the country’s total emissions but this has also provided a continuous valuable source of income. At the same time, the sector is strongly impacted by climate change. So, Suriname focusses on the development of climate-smart farming. That includes water resources management, the promotion of sustainable land management; and adopting innovative technologies, for example converting biomass into energy.

For transport, Suriname wants to improve public transportation and introduce controls on vehicle emissions.

Lotus flowers in a little canal in Suriname. Did you know these beautiful flowers only grow in the mud?

It is going to be quite a road to combine economic and sustainability goals. Suriname is well worth the effort.

But in the meanwhile, what can Surinam do for such long-term ambitions? Still the state has a ‘waterhead’ on government, which in combination with prestige projects like the Wijdenbosch Bridge, led to a state debt. The pay back forms the largest costs each year. And still, the salaries have to be paid every term of the month, being the second largest costs.

Surinam needs foreign money, but their banks mostly block the ways to get it in.

A concrete example. Peter rented a car and payed with some left-over Euros. The rental man was very happy with it.

At the gas station Peter topped up the petrol tank. The gas station does not accept a credit card, only cash Surinam Dollars. So, Peter goes to the ATM for cash. Every ATM has a waiting line (otherwise they don’t work). Peter tried to get money from the ATM, but at the very end of the procedure, it says “No”. Peter tries his other card. This one does not work either, also at the very end. Only result is that the line gets longer. Peter tried other ATMs. No way.

Peter went to the bank. The line was 45 minutes. The answer was:

“Please try it later.” Peter tried it later with 5 other ATMs. Again, Peter went to bank, and was helped after 35 minutes. The answer was also here:

“Please try it later.” Peter said he already did. They answered:

“Please try it tomorrow.”

So, from 11 AM till 4 PM Peter has tried to get Surinam dollars, but zero success. He would have much preferred to spend this time to buy things, eat Surinam meals etc. That day Peter heard all the professional answers for: “we are too incompetent to get money from foreign bank accounts”. These unwilling ATMs are not an incident; it is structural.

Sources:

https://news.un.org/en/story/2020/01/1056422

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change_in_Suriname

Like to join the ‘Ya’ on her sustainable cruises? mail info@fossilfreearoundtheworld.org

March 10, 2022March 10, 2022

Ya buys local at Saint Laurent du Maroni

It is French and Caribbean. The colours are truly impressive. Fruits and vegetables as far as you can see, sold by vendors from French Guyana and Surinam. There is every reason to buy local from a sustainability point of view. But the truth is: it is just too good not to do so!

Best ask what the fruits and vegetables are and how to prepare them. For example the green/orange fruit of a palmtree, the Parepou has to be boilt for 35 minutes and it tasts like a sweet potato! Parepou recipe

The lady warned me that the chilies are really hot.

The colorful arrangements catch the eye…

The pepper and chilies look like candy. Best not to believe that.

Cucumbers that look like courgettes, courgette-like vegetables that look like cucumbers, everything is possible.

The ‘harvest’ of our first shopping tour, note especially the small bananas and local ‘chestnuts’ that have to be boiled for 20 minutes.

The second shopping tour brought for example the red ‘pommes d’amour (recipe), fragrant Cupuaco (recipe), and the sour gooseberries (recipe).

Take it away!

If you don’t feel like cooking, on the Saturday market you can buy French-Guyanese delicacies.

the French-inspired ‘tarte-a-‘l’onion’….

and the tasty ‘jamais goûté’ that is only caught on Maroni river.

But how about the weather?

Even on a rainy day (and there are lots, it is the rainy season) everybody takes out the umbrella and goes there. It is fun.

Enjoy your local markets!

Buying local saves an awful lot on fossil fuels (prevention on cooled transport and storage), and we can store it longer. And, it is more fun!

You want to join us on our sailing fossil free sailing and living? Then contact us.

March 5, 2022March 5, 2022

Booming weed in the ocean

During our trip, we saw lots of weed in the ocean. We did some research and quickly found the answer: it is Sargassum weed and it has been b(l)ooming since 2011. Columbus already wrote about the Sargasso Sea, as a strange local phenomenon. However, the massive growth we see now, could have rather scary consequences.

What did we see?

We saw the weed all the time. Watch with us some seconds

*The wind and waves shape the weed in endless long lanes through the ocean*

We took some weed to see what it looked like from nearby, and then used the microscope we use for the GOES project.

On some of the weed, you can see small black dots, mainly in the ‘hair’ of the weed. These could be plants or plastics.

Our first conclusion was that there might be plants as well as plastics in the ‘hairs’ of the weed. But this is up to biologists.

Is this weed really that much?
The growth of the weed has been documented and studied over the last 10 years.

In 2018 the weed stretched 8850 km in the Atlantic. It weighed 22.000.000.000 kg, the equivalent of 1,5 million middle class cars. and is more than 4 times the pyramid of Giza in Egypt. And it has not gotten much less in recent years.

Why does the weed grow so fast?

The most likely cause is climate change. The Sahara dries and grows, and the dust clouds spreading at sea are rich in nutrients. Climate change also leads to the upwelling of nutrients from deep ocean waters at the other end of the sargassum belt in West Africa. Also, fertilizer flows into the Amazon River and the Mississippi River and then to the ocean. The fertilizer comes from industrial-scale agriculture (corn, soja) and (meat) ranches.

*Sargassum field near Big Pine Key in Florida, source*

Is it good or bad?

The Sargasso sea, that gave the weed its name, is a nursery for marine life. The weed shelters plankton, eel, fish and turtles. But the huge growth in the last decade keeps the sunlight away from marine life and that is a real threat. This is because it can result in low oxygen levels and create hydrogen sulphide, potentially causing the death of marine life (Pfaff 2015).

The picture shows and describes the effect of Sargassum mats on mammals, fish and plants. Source

Sargassum weed on Playa del Carmen, Mexico. Source

Also, some of the weed ends up on the beaches of the Caribbean isles and Mexico. Ecologically this is a tiny bit, but the impact for us humans is big.

Check out this news item: When the weed rots away, it emits a toxic gas, smelling of rotten eggs,

To a solution

The scale is so big, that Mexico deployed the Mexican navy to clean it up from the beautiful white beaches. But, the commanding officer admits that it is hopeless work.
Some communities plow the seaweed under the sand. But you can do it once or twice and then the white beach becomes more and more brownish soil.

An engineering company made a ‘Sargassum Seaweed Barrier’ before the beach. It works in normal weather circumstances. But they don’t know what to do with the Sargassum that is caught.

On small scale, people collect it, wash off the salt with (scarce) fresh water and convert it to natural fertilizer. In Mexico some entrepreneurs compress this into bricks and use it, like adobe, for building construction. Problem is that the scale is way to big. Even on a large scale, it would not solve even 0,000001 % of the problem.

In the Netherlands, Wageningen University found a way to convert it into biogas and into fertilizer. But it is not commercially interesting, it creates new side effects. Most of all, although this university proves international excellence on ecology and (marine) biology sciences, it neglects the problem itself, and its cause. Instead of the ocean scale, it narrows the sustainability vision down to a the scale of a coast, or a beach.

In this movie the MIT/PERG researchers put up the idea called ‘SOS Carbon’. Idea is to pump all weed deep into the ocean, where it will die of overpressure and sink to the bottom. But being aware of the gigantic scale of this project, they doubt about the feasibility. Also, they did not check any side effect. So, they narrowed it down to a project to harvest only the weed that could reach the beach and then pump that down to the deep sea on the spot.

Solution from 5 miles to 5000 miles.

All solutions have in common that they don’t look further than the horizon of the coast. Let us say: 5 miles. But the problem is a wide belt about five thousand miles, on a complete ocean as a matter of fact. These solutions are symptom-fighting. In no solution the ecological impact is addressed, neither of the solution, nor of the other 4995 miles. Nobody seems to know if this massive growth will continue, or if it is just a temporary reaction in the eco system. Even the UN Environmental Programme’s white paper focuses only on the solutions for the surplus of weed, because they are not sure if there is anything that can be done about the cause.

The only solution that addresses the scale is the prevention of the entire problem. Prevention is nearly always the cheapest solution and has the guarantee of zero new side effects. This means that we have to address climate change and nitrogen emissions from human activities in the first place. Yes, this is a look in the mirror, and yes, that can hurt. But the solution, living fossil free, will deliver a better life for you, for the next generations and for the rest of the world. That is sustainable.
Impossible? We live fossil free on “Ya”. Join us. We all can save a bit of the world for our children.

February 26, 2022February 26, 2022

A Big Thank To You

You remember our movie Children deep down in Gambia about the life of the children in the little fishers village, and the school with all its needs?
At the end we asked for a donation.
Now, this is one of the pictures we got from the principal of the school:

The principal of the school in Jarreng Tenda has sent us some pictures, like this one.

You know what the principal wrote?

Mr. Adama wrote us: “Dear Peter and Inge, with the money you have sent (…) we could repair the three blackboards of the Jarreng school and we express a big thank to you and the donors.”

As promised earlier: every penny of your donation went straight to the school, so no ‘sticking’ costs. We were lucky that we could avoid bank transfer costs, which are 5 to 10 times higher for third world countries. We got help from Hetty of the Jappaleh foundation, who could give the cash straight away. They do good work for many schools in Gambia.

Hetty of the Jappaleh foundation just gave your donations already converted into Dalasi, to the principal Mr. Adama of the Jarreng Tenda school. On the background teacher Ms Awa Bah, who showed us the school and discussed all challenges they face.

Again: a big thank you!

You want to sail the sea and the ocean fossil free on ‘Ya’? Mail to info@fossilfreearoundtheworld.org
or app us on +316 283 44 823 (Signal, Whatsapp)

February 19, 2022February 19, 2022

Sampling microplastic on the ocean

The ‘Ya’ is participating in the survey project to take samples to survey the oceans and seas on micro plastics.
In an earlier article we wrote about the worrying state of the ocean. The chemicals and plastics polluting the oceans and plankton, the number one CO2 ‘converter’ to Carbon, is diminishing on a mass scale.
The data about this problem are poor. Now, the GOES foundation (Global Ocean and Environmental Survey) has organized a Citizens (Sailors) Science Project. They armed ‘Ya’ with a sample tube, a microscope, an app on the computer, and a manual how to do it all.
Watch the movie here how we take samples to check the microplastics in the ocean.

‘Ya’ is part of the ‘Citizens (Sailors) Science Project of the GOES Foundation, sampling for data to answer the cry from the ocean.

Are you a sailor and interested in participating? mail GOES foundation and ask what you can do.

February 11, 2022February 11, 2022

Swimming with turtles at Sao Vicente

In Sao Vincente we went swimming with turtles.. Turtle House keeps the beach of San Pedro and the sea clean and feeds the turtles; they instruct the tourists so they use the right sunscreen and don’t touch the animals. This way they raise awareness, protect the turtle population and make a living. Triple gain! This is the tourism we like.

From start to finish: experience swimming with big turtles!

Here at Sao Pedro, we saw the loggerhead turtle (Caretta caretta). “They nest at night in summer,” our host Jair Roche from Turtle House said. “The females find a suitable site on the beach to lay her eggs. Some two-and-a-half months later, the young turtles climb out of the nest and go to sea. Of each thousand, only one or two survive until maturity. The females return 12 to 15 years later to the same beach to nest again.”

Last decades the number dropped dramatically. This is why all over the world, people take the initiative to increase the population again. Raising awareness helps. For example, little turtles instinctively go to the light area, which is the sea. But since the hotels along the beach give lots of light at night, they ran to the shore with all its roads and animals, instead of to the safer sea. Now the hotels dim their light towards the sea when it is night, the turtles can find their way again. Turtle nurseries are trying to guide the turtles to safer places. And, of course, eating turtles is ‘not-done’ anymore.

February 4, 2022January 17, 2022

Ya bakes a solar cake

Several of our sailing friends are really enthusiastic about solar cooking. It’s the most direct way of using solar energy, so naturally, we wanted to try this oven ourselves. Karin from sv “Marelief” made it possible!

Equal portions of flour, sugar and butter; 1 egg, some baking powder and salt. Stir well.

Zen and the art of solar cake-baking

Setting up the solar oven and the core-thermometer

When it beeps it’s ready

On the pontoon, our solar cake attracted international attention

Enthusiastic? You can build them yourself!

https://www.homesciencetools.com/article/how-to-build-a-solar-oven-project/

https://www.luckybelly.com/how-to-make-a-solar-oven/

https://www.wikihow.com/Make-and-Use-a-Solar-Oven

January 28, 2022January 23, 2022

LFP (4/4) Issues and opportunities around the LiFePO4 battery bank

The former article showed that the installation of an LFP battery bank is different from the lead acid. Here we describe how we dealt with these differences on the Ya. Take your advantage of it.

Prevent exchange costs

Firstly, you’d better not do what we did on ‘Ya’. We first chose for a lead acid bank and now we exchanged it for LFP. You’d better choose for LFP straight away. We now had to throw away the old lead acid devices, e.g., our main hand battery switch of over 100 Euros, a volt meter, and much more. And, a lead acid bank costs more space and has more weight. In the first place, it has cost a lot of money to realize this. And now with the LFP bank, we have two water and air tight compartments left over. It is all pity money spent.

On the left you see the former Starboard set of lead acid batteries, taking two compartments (On the portside the same set.) In the middle picture the compartments emptied. On the right the LFP bank, and we did not need the front compartment anymore.

Check the compatibility of BMS, CAN bus and charger

One of the beauties of the BMS that it manages the whole charging process. It controls all these little circuit boards in such a way, that a ‘difficult’ cell gets more, an ‘easy’ cell gets less energy. Hence, they all get charged equally, until every cell is at its maximum at exactly 3.65Volt. This last phase is called the balancing phase. Then the charging energy is very little, but very precise. Therefore, the BMS must be able to regulate your charger precisely. It asks for a good communication.

Then you need a CAN bus between the BMS and the charger. You buy the thing from your charger supplier. In case of ‘Ya’ we have a Studer xTender (inverter and charger). Studer delivers the xCom-CAN with a variety of protocols and communication speeds, so no problem for us. But, make sure that there is one that your BMS can communicate with. Make sure, before you buy the BMS (or the charger).

The professional installer like in our case EV Europe, can configure it all.

In the battery compartment there was plenty space to also build in the BMS (right, behind the white panel), the CAN bus (in the middle, also see inset to the very right) and the DC/DC converter (to the left)

Full-automatic system requires solid, reliable work

Full automation sounds beautiful, but a BMS with incorrect feeds, can fully automatically damage your equipment. We made the next mistake.

On ‘Ya’ the BMS got its feed from our 12 Volt service battery, an AGM battery already of age. It also feeds the anchor winch. The voltage drops were big, so the BMS switched the main relay switch on and off and on and off, about 5 times per seconds. This created a chaotic flow of currents running up and down the various charge devices. In one anchor maneuver, these freak currents blew the fuses of the solar MPPT and converter, and the wind generator’s MPPT died.

We did two things to solve this:

We eliminated the cause by giving the BMS a separate 12V power supply. Many choose for a battery, but we installed the higly reliable Studer DC/DC converter. The feed comes straight from the 48 Volt battery bank, through this DC/DC converter feeding the BMS and all its equipment, such as the relay switch.

2. We contained the possible impact, by:
– Installing a relay switch on the output of each of the three charging devices (solar, solar and wind).
– Connecting a relay on the input of the wind MPPT. This works as a short circuit, to slow down the wind turbine.
– Installation of an extra resistor on the output side of the wind turbine, just in case the turbine runs another 2 or three rotations and generating a last bit of power. This would flow into that resistor.

So, now when the BMS switches off the main relay, it also switches off the charging devices and no freak current can enter any device or electronics.

This is also nice if someone is working on the electricity: there is really no power on the net, so no risk of fire or damage when working.

The feed to the Contactor (main switch relay) is also feeding the relay switches that disconnect the outputs of the two solar controllers, and the SilentWind controller. The latter also has a switch to stop the generator, and a resistor to take the possible last current. When the Contactor switches off, every charger output is switched off.

Dry compartments

Main cause of failures of electrics and electronics is the bad, corroded contact, mostly caused by moist and dirt. On a sea going yacht, you have a lot of moist and salt. Connections can easily rot away in that environment. So we climatized this environment of the battery bank and devices.

The lead acid battery bank was put in air tight compartments in the bilge. Now we put LiFePO4cells in it. And, these cells are so small, they don’t take much space. So there was plenty space to make a circular ventilation duct through the compartments, with a dehumidifier. Now, once a day the little 5-Watt ventilator and the 40-Watt dehumidifier run for an hour. It keeps both battery compartments, including the BMS, CAN bus, 48/12 DC-DC converter, circuit boards and all connections, extremely dry.

This is the SB compartment. Inge’s finger shows the ventilation duct. In there, under her finger, is a ventilator. It moves the air through the duct under the batteries, the air is pushed up at the end and then comes back over the top, where the air passes a dehumidifier and goes into a channel to the Port compartment making the same route. The dominant round white thing is the dehumidifier. A little line drains the water to the bilge pump. Now, the compartments are always very dry.

Bypassing contactor manually for charging purposes

It is rare, but suppose you get this scenario.

You are at sea and for whatever reason the battery bank is low. And then, there is no sun and no wind, for days and days. Meanwhile you cook, use navigation equipment, so the bank gets lower and lower. Then, one night, the voltage becomes too low and so the BMS disconnects the Contactor (main switch battery bank).

Then in the morning, the sun starts shining. Since the switch is off, the solar power feed is disconnected from the battery bank, so it won’t charge. Now you are in a Catch 22.

Therefore, we have a little button that switches on the contactor and other relay switches, so the energy can flow into the bank. You have to push actively. When you let it go, the circuit is broken again. But that pushing won’t take long because we are in a steep curve, where a little bit of energy is already enough to quickly raise the voltage. And if something else is wrong, the push button makes you very aware of that and you have full attention to the system.

Here behind the front panel, we made the contactor, together with the fuse visible. If the BMS switched the contactor off, there is this so-called ‘Momentary Push Buttton Switch’ to switch the contactor (and other relay switches) back on. So even when the voltage is too low, we can charge, but with continuous care and attention.

Some extra beeps

The Battery Management System is measuring so much, and is so well in full control, that it invited us to take profit of this advantage. Naturally you get readings on your display when something is going wrong, and even with pre-warnings. But we liked to have some hard signals you can hear. So, there is a high beep now, when the battery bank’s voltage gets too high. There is a low beep when the voltage drops too low and the battery bank is almost empty. And we have another low beep as a pre warning if the battery bank has only 10% left to use. Very nice that you are pre warned before you are confronted with dead engines when you are maneuvering in a harbor.

It just takes some extra hours for installing and mounting the cables, for the rest it is just a matter of some computer settings in the configuration.

*This is the EMUS BMS. on the circuit board. EV Europe made this circuit board to have all the outlets and the pins around it, so there are many possibilities for extra options.*

The usual extra attention to the alternator

A wind turbine contains an alternator and this is one that you can stop. But if you have a diesel engine with an alternator to charge your batteries, you have the usual problem (next to all problems there are with combustion engines).

The general problem of alternators: you cannot disconnect the output from the battery bank, because the diodes of the alternator would blow up. So, you have to stop the alternator before. When you have a combustion (diesel) engine, you first have to stop the engine before you turn the main battery switch to OFF.

When you take an LFP bank with a BMS, and so an automatic relay switch, the contactor (main switch) is automatic. Whenever there is a chance of fire, or ruining the batteries, because of under or over voltage, it will disconnect automatically.

There are some solutions.

The alternator feed bypasses the main switch. Many boats have this already. The problem is, when you work on the battery bank with the main switch on OFF, and the engine starts running, there is still electricity on the net. And the other way around: when a normal user (like a leisure skipper) switches off the main switch for whatever reason (chance on fire?), he presumes to be safe and have an power free circuit. But, when using the engine, there is electricity again. So again a risk on fire?
Modify the alternator, so the field current is stopped, and the alternator stops charging.
The generations after you will tell you that the best solution is to stop combusting CO2, NOx, SOx and fine dust into the air, and take electric engines for your leisure. They are also much more reliable too.  See this article

Why electric engines are better

This is the last of the 4 articles about LFP/LiFePO4 battery bank compared to lead acid.
Here you find a more technical description of an installation of a service pack.

January 21, 2022January 18, 2022

Ya goes GOES

“Suppose that sailors all over the world take samples and send the results to marine biologist researchers. We would know a lot more about the state of the oceans then” says Dr. Howard Dryden, GOES, (Global Oceanic Environmental Survey). We agree, so Ya will participate in the GOES-project.

Why GOES?
Ocean acidity is rising. This will have disastrous effects on marine environment. The most probable cause is chemical pollution. GOES wants to estimate the amount of toxic chemicals in the ocean. With this evidence, industry and governments can be urged to stop polluting our atmosphere, soil and water with toxic for-ever chemicals and plastic. So, GOES needs more data; data we as sailors can collect. This is why Ya will go GOES.

The role of plankton in keeping the oceans healthy

Tiny animals and plants in the oceans (<1mm) control our climate and atmosphere. They are the life support system for the entire planet. But through pollution we have reduced the numbers of tiny planktonic plants and animals by 50%. They eat microplastic, loaded with toxic chemicals, which destroys them. This destruction continues at a rate of 1%, year on year.

What will we see during our trip?

Under a simple microscope you can see diatoms, responsible for 40% of all carbon removed from the world’s oceans

We will see diatoms, who are responsible for around 40% of the removal of all carbon from the world’s oceans.

Some of them ‘eat’ particles from the water. This makes them very sensitive to plastic and chemical pollution. The diatoms create inspiring shapes and structures, using silica. So, we are looking forward to seeing them!

COPEPODS: poop and water mixing

*This tiny animal, of around 1 mmm, is a Copepod.*

There are around 5 billion tonnes of Copepods in the oceans. They usually measure around 1mm. If you would put the Copepods in one great big pile, that pile would be ten times heavier than a pile of all land animals combined. Every year, Copepods poop 30 times more carbon than humans use in the form of fossil fuels, and 6% of their poop (3 Giga tonnes of carbon) is locked away in the abyss. The rest is recycled to the surface. Other animals and bacteria use poop for food, used as fertiliser for plant, bacteria turn it into nutrients etc.: allowing the cycle to continue.

Also spectacular is that, every night, they swim from a depth of 400m to the surface, where they feed on algae and other planktonic plants. Together they move more water than the moon and the tides! They are some of the most important animals on the planet. We have never heard of them before. So, we hope to spot lots of them under the microscope.

How we get the data

*To gather the data from the ocean, we need a sampling tube and a simple microscope, and a computer to connect and save the data*.

We connect the microscope to a computer and we will collect samples on Ya twice a day (if the weather permits it). We take 0.5 litre of sea water and filter it. Then comes the exciting part. Under the microscope, we count plankton, microplastic (fibres and beads) and any other particles larger than 20 microns. We will take pictures to register what we see. When we have a stable WIFI-connection, we will send the data to GOES.

GOES will:
1. look for relationships and correlations in the numbers;
2. present the data in ways that help us understand what’s going on in the deep ocean;
3. calculate the amount of toxic PCB that is in the deep oceans of our planet.

Every plastic particle contains a very toxic chemical called Poly Chlorinated Bisphenols (PCBs). PCB’s have been banned for over 45 years, but they still find their way to the environment, especially when waste is not carefully managed. We find this in all the oceans. The chemicals concentrate many thousands or millions of times on the plastic. Chemicals like, PBDE, PFOS and cosmetic ingredients such as oxybenzone. The toxic chemical plastic combination is killing the plankton responsible for removing most of our carbon dioxide and producing our oxygen. If plankton does not remove carbon dioxide from the water, it forms carbonic acid, it will make the oceans more acidic.

Why is it necessary to stop ocean acidification?
When ocean acidity reaches pH 7.95 the marine environment will collapse. This could be in 25 years. Even if the world became carbon neutral tomorrow, the oceans would reach this acidity-level only 5 years later. So, yes, besides reducing our use of fossil fuels, we must also stop ocean acidification. Because climate change will be bad, but humanity may not be able to survive ocean acidification and the loss of most marine life.

How do we stop the acidification process?

•       Stop chemical pollution in general; use less chemicals
•       Stop plastic leaving rivers and reaching the ocean
•       Replace toxic chemicals with green options; ask for ocean-friendly products
Ocean plants in a healthy environment will double their mass every 3 days and ‘eat’ millions of tonnes of carbon. This would greatly help solving the climate crisis. And because we want to know how the situation really is now, we will collect data for GOES.

Do you want to support GOES?

Even if you are not a sailor, you are welcome to support the GOES project. You can start your ocean-conscious life right away. Or, can join in workshops and online training sessions. Just email diane@goesfoundation.com
If you are a sailor, you are more than welcome to join the project as we described above. For full details of the equipment and ordering details click here

January 14, 2022January 14, 2022

LFP (3/4) The LiFePO4 battery bank installed

In one article we discussed the choice between LFP (or LiFePO4) batteries and lead acid batteries. In a second article, the business case, we saw that LFP batteries are cheaper. So, we installed a 42.5 kWh LFP battery bank, to serve our household and electric engines of our self-sufficient ‘Ya’.

Our 42.5 kWh battery bank of 48 Volt on ‘Ya’ consists of 16 times 3 cells. The port part (top) has 10X 3 cells, the starboard part (down) the last 6 X 3 cells. The SB part is smaller to preserve place for the BMS and other accessories.

How did it work out? Much differences with the old lead acid batteries are caused by the lower internal resistance in LiFePO4 batteries. This is great for the efficiency, and it has other consequences. We work them out, and others.

This is the behaviour of a LiFePO4 cell on ‘Ya’. The three ilnes show three consumption rates. Generally, the difference of a nearly full (3.25V) or 20% empty (2.9V) LFP battery cell is only about 0.35 volt. Even when you use it heavily, the voltage of an LFP cell hardly drops. This means that the internal resistance is low.

You get what you see

The lead acid batteries always have a loss on taking the energy in and delivering it out again. This makes you a bit uncertain/unsure how much energy you actually have. To prevent this loss, we tried to use the energy immediately when it is produced (by solar, wind or hydro). So we baked our bread around noon, and made our dinner before 5 PM. It saved 10-30%. Technically, the high internal resistance is the cause of this (see the first article).

The LFP hardly has this disadvantage: the energy coming into the LFP batteries, will be the energy coming out. What you see going in, you also get it out. It makes you happy.

*On the left you see how full the battery is. One tap on the display and you see (on the right) the basic numbers. We are especially interested in how many Watts are going in and out.*

You get what you want

Now our engines work better and more reliable in the extreme power range. When the lead acid battery bank was low, I have always doubted if the electric engines could deliver the full 15 kW power they should be able to. Well, they couldn’t, because the voltage dropped too much. Once when the (old) lead acid battery bank was low, and I blew both the engines full power for 5 minutes, the engines stopped. The engine displays said “voltage too low’. It could not deliver the 15-kW needed.
You will see the same if you have a heavy power equipment, like an anchor winch, connected to a 30-40% charged lead acid battery.

By contrast, the LFP delivers the power you want till the battery is really empty – or at least to 10%.

Check your cables and connections

You replaced the batteries from lead acid to LFP? Then switch everything on full power and check if your cables and connections don’t get hot-it can cause fire! This can happen now since, due to the internal resistance, the old lead acid batteries never delivered the power that was asked for. But the LFP’s really do deliver this power! So now you get more current through the cables and connections. These cables and connections have resistance, so that means more heat. When a cable is hot (or a connection is bad), you will feel heat there. Prevent fire and fix the connection or replace the cable for a thicker one.

LFP is all-automatic

With the LFP-batteries you get a complete Battery Management System (BMS). Initially you (or your supplier/installer) plugs in a computer on a USB connection to configure all settings. Once set, the system runs.

The core of the Battery Management System is the black ‘EMUS’ box in the middle. EV Europe’s circuit board around it, and all pins, make the installation convenient and versatile. In Inge’s hand is the USB connection for a computer to configurate the BMS. *Down left you find the Studer xCOM-CAN bus, to make communication possible between BMS and Studers’ charger.*

There is a display with the BMS, for the daily use and readings. But you can also connect your cell phone through blue tooth (see above: ‘You get what you see’). It shows you everything, even the status of each cell. This display is for the daily user.

*Not only the BMS can shut the system off, but also the crew, by pushing this emergency button.*

All-automatic commits to know your system

Most accidents on yachts happen, because we leisure skippers simply don’t know how the equipment is working. It is nice to live not hindered by any knowledge. But once it will go wrong, also with an excellent working ship and equipment.

OK, we are leisure sailors, but there is a limit to not knowing what you are playing with. I would say, the minimum is that you can draw out the equipment of your system and can find it on board. This is:

The battery cells
The BMS with:
- The (12 Volt) feed wire to the BMS
- The fuse of the feed wire
- Contactor (the central big relay switch)
- Emergency button (switch)
- The cable to connect the BMS to your computer
- The cable or Bluetooth connection to your display
- Display with the basic numbers (Volts, Temp, Watts coming in or out)
- Display with the numbers per cell
- (If installed: Low/high voltage warning beeps)
- The CAM (‘talking device’ between BMS and charger)
The charger and the AC (110/220 V) plug
The AC fuse of your charger

*You can draw the system yourself, but our supplier EV Europe has drawn it the professional way in a Wiring Diagram.*

LFP is zip maintenance

Over the years, I developed a relationship with my lead acid battery bank. Next to some attention, the bank needed maintenance. For lead acid batteries, this means: keep your lead acid always full. But I could not do that. The bank became ‘lazy’. So, every three months I made some deep charges and discharges, I measured the density of the acid mix, and topped up the evaporated demin water.

LFP comes with a BMS and it does not need this TLC. The BMS saves you from trouble and does the maintenance. This consists mainly of balancing the cell voltages, which means: keep them equal. This is done automatically during the last charging phase, nearing the 100%.

On ‘Ya’, we live and sail fossil free. Our battery bank is our energy buffer and never at 100%. So, the supplier advised us to do a full charge every 3 months. So, our maintenance consists of putting the 220 Volt plug of the charger in the shore power for a day every three months. We can handle that.

Deeper in the app, you will find the necessary numbers per cell, and that is nice when there is doubt about one or more cells. Here you see a shot of the balancing phase, where all cells will be charged till the maximum of 3.65Volt.

This is the SB part of the 48 Volt battery bank on ‘Ya’. Every cell has its own little circuit board, to measure voltage and temperature. See the inserted blow-up on the left. Now the BMS also regulates each circuit board to balance out the final highest voltage at 100% charge, exactly 3.65 Volt.

In the next and last article all extra features will be treated on a more technical level. We will discuss things like:

The alternator. With the lead acid battery bank, one never can switch the main switch off when the alternator runs (like a windturbine). This would blow the alternator. With the LFP bank this switch is automized. Reason to tackle this problem.
The feed of the BMS and contactor can become a Catch 22. We discuss that.

And we discuss all other extra features and possible problems we found in the installation.

Want to know where we are? See
https://fossilfreearoundtheworld.org/map-where-we-are-now-position-of-the-ya/

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