Edison Marine, located in Portland, OR, has an electric boat at the Seattle Boat Show. My 8-year-old daughter said “Wow, that’s really shiny for wood.” Clever girl.
It is shiny, indeed. Constructed of mahogany, she looks for all the world like a 1940 barrelback runabout. Lovely, but not really innovative by itself.
The magic of the Edison boat is hidden inside, and below the waterline. This is a twin-prop 17-footer powered by a bank of 12 batteries.
The basics: She’ll run plenty fast…see the video under “Gallery” on the Edison Marine website. But to maximize battery life, run her at 5-6 mph and the batteries will last 8 hrs or so. Full recharge takes 4-5 hours. How much? About $120k as shown.
Here are some pictures I took at the show.
2 responses so far ↓
Sarge // Feb 12, 2008 at 8:12 pm
I think this is a great idea, but the cost! I own an all electric vehicle, a Neighborhood Electric Vehicle (NEV) which cost me ~$18K, $100K less than this boat. It is actually useful, allowing me to run errands within town and able to carry my entire family. This is more of an expensive toy.
You have to start somewhere and I commend them for that. It would be nice to see something a little less ‘pretty’ and more practical for the everyday boater. They have electric scooters (http://www.evadermotorsports.com/) and electric ATVs (www.gorillavehicles.com), maybe the first practical application for water would be an electric watercraft/jetski.
Or course, there are Torqeedos and other electric trolling motors that can be used on a standard small boat.
As batteries get better and gas more expensive, we’ll all look back on this expensive boat as an initial step in the right direction.
Tom Wicke // Jun 2, 2008 at 12:27 pm
We are working on several variations of our prototype. Yes this is a big boy toy. But then again are not most boats big toys? We had to start somewhere and this is where we decided to begin. With the weigh of batteries you need to have a fair amount of displacement to get any performance. The future holds great promise for all electric powered vehicles from small scooters to full size boats. We at Edison marine are committed to production of a boat that is not only clean but also very beautiful as well.
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