• PowerCrazy@lemmy.ml
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    5 months ago

    Why not an electric train? There is contiguous land between the two cities, and then you don’t have to carry your fuel with you or build giant batteries out of rare earth minerals, while risking run-away shorts that will surely endanger everyone on board, and ensure the cargo is lost.

    Plus the distance is <300kms.

          • erwan@lemmy.ml
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            5 months ago

            It’s slow and you depend on the wind blowing.

            If sails were that great we would still be using them for freight, we didn’t switch to petroleum for the fun of it. Environmental issues put aside it’s a pretty great source of energy.

            • Gabu@lemmy.ml
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              5 months ago

              you depend on the wind blowing.

              For achieving maximum speed, sure. To simply guarantee you get there? Not at all - the Iberians knew how to navigate solely on maritime currents 500 years ago.

              If sails were that great we would still be using them for freight, we didn’t switch to petroleum for the fun of it.

              We started using pretroleum because capitalism requires infinite growth as fast as you can muster it. Particularly with modern refrigeration techniques and automation, time insensitive navigation for transport could easily be done with sails.