> I wonder. From first principles, I don't quite understand how cruise ships can be that bad.
Because of tragedy of commons. There is very little environmental regulation affecting shipping. And cruise ships can utilise flags of convenience to skirt the little that there is.
You could totally make them more efficient and less harmful, but that would cost money, and hence hurt shareholder value.
For example, we've been cruising on a sailboat since last April. Germany - Scotland - Madeira - Canary Islands. All areas also frequented by cruise ships. Almost all of our electricity (~1.4kWh per day) comes from solar and wind. We do burn some fuel when becalmed or doing harbour manouvers. Since mid-July we burned 140l of diesel, which comes to 380kg of CO2. Not nothing, but also not terrible.
On top of that we burn about 1l of ethanol per week for cooking purposes.
Building the sailboat of course caused a lot of emissions, but amortised over the 45 years this boat has been sailing, probably aren't too bad. And equipment like sails and ropes are mostly made of recycled plastics, and last many years.
But of course we lack some luxuries that the cruising customers expect. There's no AC, and the only swimming pool available is the sea. Showers are on deck and require boiling some hot water. And worse of all, we don't have the energy budget to run Starlink 24/7, so there's only couple of hours of Internet per day.
Because of tragedy of commons. There is very little environmental regulation affecting shipping. And cruise ships can utilise flags of convenience to skirt the little that there is.
You could totally make them more efficient and less harmful, but that would cost money, and hence hurt shareholder value.
For example, we've been cruising on a sailboat since last April. Germany - Scotland - Madeira - Canary Islands. All areas also frequented by cruise ships. Almost all of our electricity (~1.4kWh per day) comes from solar and wind. We do burn some fuel when becalmed or doing harbour manouvers. Since mid-July we burned 140l of diesel, which comes to 380kg of CO2. Not nothing, but also not terrible. On top of that we burn about 1l of ethanol per week for cooking purposes. Building the sailboat of course caused a lot of emissions, but amortised over the 45 years this boat has been sailing, probably aren't too bad. And equipment like sails and ropes are mostly made of recycled plastics, and last many years.
But of course we lack some luxuries that the cruising customers expect. There's no AC, and the only swimming pool available is the sea. Showers are on deck and require boiling some hot water. And worse of all, we don't have the energy budget to run Starlink 24/7, so there's only couple of hours of Internet per day.