It could almost be the scene of a picture postcard: old boats dotted around the French coastline, moving with the tide. But their environmental impact is a lot less charming. Most boats are made of fibreglass, plastics and resins, making them difficult to recycle. But is there another way? Can sustainable boating set sail? We take a closer look in this edition of Down to Earth.
A graveyard for boats
Located at the very end of a tiny peninsula, Gâvres is a typical picturesque town in Brittany, France. Boats stranded along the shore at low tide are a common sight. But as you get closer, hulls turned upside down, worn paint and mould growing on the derelict boats tell a different story.
Some are wooden, from the 20th century. Others are a lot more recent and made of plastic. What they both have in common is that they have been dumped there by the owners, turning a quiet beach into an eerie marine graveyard.
According to Vassilis Spyratos from the Morbihan Sea and Land Agency, this is just one example among many across France. A clean-up operation will soon begin in Gâvres to remove the abandoned boats, sponsored by local authorities.
"It shouldn't be here," says Spyratos, pointing to a small catamaran. "It's as if you had a bunch of garbage or your old car you needed to get rid of and you dumped it in the nearest forest."
And Gâvres is not an exception. There are many others like it along France's coastline.
"In the Morbihan department alone, we remove about 40 wrecks per year," he concludes.
Toxic waste
Abandoned boats don’t just pollute the view. They're also an environmental hazard.
It’s hard to know just how many have been dumped by their owners onshore, in harbours, gardens and landfills. But there could be as many as 5,000 wrecks along France's coastline.
As they crack and age, boats release a wide range of substances, many of which cannot degrade, like tiny bits of plastic and fibreglass. The paint begins to fade, not to mention oil, fuel and battery fluid leaking from the wreckage.
All this waste will continue to pile up as more vessels enter the age of retirement, many of them dating back to the 1960s. Add to that their relatively short lifespan of 30 to 40 years, and the need to dismantle and properly dispose of ageing vessels will only grow exponentially.
Dismantling old boats
One of the main challenges associated with the disposal of old boats is the fact that they're made of so many different materials: plastic, aluminium and steel.
Dismantling them has become a French specificity, and many countries in Europe are now looking to their neighbour as a model. Since 2019, France has set up a waste-treatment mechanism that's unique in the world.
"For each boat sold in France, the manufacturer collects a small sum of money which is then transferred to our organisation APER to pay for the dismantling of old boats," explains Lucas Debièvre, the association's deputy director.
"It is a bit like a pension system," he adds. "The sale of new boats pays for end-of-life vessels. We are the only country in the world to do this."
Since August 2019, APER has dismantled some 7,500 boats.
It's a meticulous process. Dangerous objects that could be left on board are removed. Any remaining fluids are drained. Only then can the boat's different components be separated and recovered: wood, metal, and electronic waste. All of it will get recycled, except the hull, which makes up about a third of the boat.
"We'll ship the hull to a specialised sorting centre, where it will be mixed with other waste and burned in incinerators that convert waste to energy," says Debièvre.
The next generation: Recyclable and made with recycled materials
Boats are normally made of composite materials, polyester and fibreglass. It's what makes them sturdy but also so hard to recycle, as this would require separating the glass fibres from the resin.
In Lausanne, Switzerland, a start-up has proved that it can be done, at least on a small scale.
"We've developed technology that allows us to recycle composite materials, fibreglass in particular," says Guillaume Perben, co-founder and CEO of Composite Recycling.
Their technology is based on a well-known technique known as pyrolysis, in which materials are heated up without oxygen. The resin, which would normally burn, is transformed into steam, and is separated from the glass fibre. Once that fibre has been cleaned, it can be reassembled with resin to make new composite materials.
In a matter of years, the industry has been able to make a considerable leap forward in the recycling of composite materials. The next step will be the manufacturing of recyclable boats.
Beneteau, the world leader in the sailing boat industry, is now rethinking the conception of its vessels, launching its first recyclable boat in 2022.
The company has integrated a new resin into its manufacturing process.
"To build a boat, we normally use materials that can be compared to an egg," explains Erwan Faoucher, Sustainability and Innovation Director at Beneteau. "It’s liquid. When you heat it up it begins to take shape. If you let it cool down, it will still be in solid form. The material we are using now is different and closer to chocolate."
Their new resin can be melted, reshaped once it becomes solid and melted again. In other words, the glass fibres and resin are not just separated but can be repurposed more easily.
"This makes our boats recyclable, unlike the boats reaching the end of their lives now. If we switch to these new materials, we'll be able to recycle them and reuse them to build a new boat, 40 years down the road," he concludes.
