Interview with the secretary general of the Yacht Club de Monaco
Monaco looks to the future by focusing on increasingly green yachting.
The Principality “with the Monaco Energy Boat Challenge,” Bernard d’Alessandri, secretary general of the Yacht Club de Monaco, explains to LaPresse, “has carried forward what has always been its vocation. As early as 1904, the concours de canots automobiles, a historic Monte Carlo event that has essentially been updated to today, was hosted here. Once there was the steam engine then the thermal and now, more than a century later, we have arrived at electric and hydrogen. New regulations already affect the automotive world and will certainly affect the marine world as well. This is our contribution to the transition.”
The event, staged for the ninth year at the Monaco Yacht Club, is part of the Monaco Capital of advanced yachting initiative. Protagonists will be carbon-free powertrains with the aim of helping to bring to life an increasingly green boating industry with a total of 50 eco-boats as the Principality moves toward the goal of zero emissions by 2050.
“For cars,” adds d’Alessandri, “there are millions of engineers at work, but for boats there are not many. Hence the idea of an initiative like the Monaco Energy Boat Challenge. We have to make a general change: we have to be ready to deal with this change for the future. It is important for the Yacht Club to have a more general vision not only related to green boats but also the harbor and the management of boats.”
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