End-of-Life Boats, options and thoughts for the future sustainability of the leisure marine industry.

1. S
ome recently-
organised
conferences about
the recycling of ‘dead’
boats have turned
the spotlight on an issue which
the boating industry has to get
to grips with – preferably with a
good degree of self-regulation,
thus avoiding the need for
heavy-handed and potentially
prohibitive legislation.
Put quite simply, the composite
construction of boat hulls from
GRP (glassfibre) created a
manufacturing boom, starting in
the late ’50s, which led to large
volumes of virtually indestructible
boats flooding the market. Now, a
large number of these are coming
to the end-of-life or end-of-use
stage at around the same time,
and in most cases for reasons
other than deterioration of the
composite hull.
Engine or rigging failure,
lack of interest, lack of finance,
advancing years or failing
health – or combinations of all
the above – are amongst the
reasons for owners literally giving
up on their boats. And there are
unfortunately plentiful examples
of boats being dumped or
abandoned with scarce regard
for the environment, or simply
left in marinas or harbours to
deteriorate. They then occupy
valuable space, preventing
new boats (and owners) from
entering the market, detracting
from profitable marina
operations, causing local
authorities financial headaches
and generally giving leisure
boating a bad image.
is just not available; and even if it
was, in today’s environmentally-
focused climate it’s hard to
rationalise how burying old GRP
hulls for future generations to
dig up and deal with can possibly
be good for the image of the
boating community.
Barriers to recycling
It is not the case that composite
recycling is mission impossible:
a few systems or processes are
commercially available in the US
and in other parts of the world.
These consist of either breaking
down the composite and
extracting the glass strand for
reuse in the lay-up process, or
grinding it up into small particles
and mixing it with an epoxy
compound, thus creating a new
material which can be used to
manufacture bollards, dock
fenders, hatch covers etc.
Another relatively new process
was revealed at a conference
entitled ‘The future of yacht
recycling’, held alongside last
year’s METSTRADE show in
Amsterdam. Supported by the
Italian marine industry association
UCINA, a specialist polymer
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Peter Franklin is the former managing editor of
yachting publication The Islander. He qualified
as a shipwright/boatbuilder and marine coatings
inspector, holds an RYA/MCA advanced
powerboat license and gained an RYA
Powerboat instructors (level 2) cert.
How it all began
An interesting insight into how this
all started comes from the USA,
where the late Connie Ray – who
founded Sea Ray Boats in Florida
– rightfully has a place in history
as a pioneer in the construction
and volume production of GRP
boats. Apparently, Ray made his
first 16ft family runabout from
GRP in 1959. Tellingly, he had
previously made coffins from the
same material, and chose it for
making his boats as he knew that
it would never rot away, even
when buried under the ground…
Ironically, in some parts of
America today this is exactly
what frustrated boat dismantlers
are doing with hundreds of GRP
hulls that they are left with, after
stripping out everything else that
is saleable or recyclable. They
drop them into landfill at a cost
of just $35 per ton, which is
commercially their only option
when the most they can get from
an owner (even if he is willing to
pay, or can be found) is $90 to
$100 per ton.
In some parts of Europe, for
instance in Germany and the
Netherlands, the landfill option
20 Practical Boat Owner 607 December 2016 • www.pbo.co.uk
Boats
End-of-life
boatsDisposal of ‘virtually indestructible’ end-of-use GRP boats is a growing
environmental challenge: Peter Franklin examines the available options
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2. research institute has managed to
grind down the GRP composite
and combine it with ground
polystyrene (another widely
available waste material). The new
mixture is then processed with
some other additives at relatively
low oven temperatures and made
into a sheet material similar to the
proprietary products used for
kitchen worktops, etc.
However, despite all
of this promising
development work, the
barriers to progress on
actually recycling composite hulls
in any appreciable volumes
remain the same; a combination
of logistical challenges, basic
economics that don’t add up and,
consequently, considerable
reluctance to actually pay for it.
Quite simply, getting several tons
of hull to the point of process,
cutting it into small enough
pieces to work with and then
reprocessing it into something
with a sales value and volume
demand high enough to offset the
cost, is just not a commercially
viable proposition… at least
thus far!
On the plus side, it should be
noted that there are now some
established disposal/dismantling
network schemes or individual
facilities operating in several
countries including France,
Sweden, the Netherlands, Japan,
Spain and the UK. Some of them
have set up online second-hand
parts stores offering a valuable
service whereby boat owners can
pick up low-cost engine or rigging
spares, navigation kit, electronics,
plumbing, fenders, steering
wheels, etc.
However, some boat dismantlers
who spoke at the yacht recycling
conference in Amsterdam last
November said that their
conversion rate on quotes given
for disposal through their facilities
were running at only one in 10
being accepted by owners. As
there is hardly any competition for
the few companies providing this
service, it unfortunately has to be
assumed that the owners of
end-of-life boats are often
choosing other, less desirable
options for their disposal.
Crunching
the numbers
A brief look at the statistics is
probably helpful at this point to
lend some perspective to the scale
of the challenge: six to seven
million leisure boats in Europe, and
anything between 30 to 40 million
worldwide. (Boat registration
schemes enabling accurate data
gathering are patchy around the
world, but this is considered to be
a conservative estimate.)
Assuming, again conservatively,
that just 50% of these are of
composite construction, that
already points to something like
20 million boats that are in the
‘doubtfully recyclable’ category,
and that is without more being
added annually.
Some more detailed data on
a national basis comes from
the Netherlands, where a very
comprehensive study has been
done by a consultancy called WA
Yachting Consultants. Based on
their survey, the prediction for the
coming five years is that around
6,000 boats currently
berthed in the water will
need to be dismantled
and disposed of. In
addition, there is a current fleet of
100,000 boats in various locations
ashore that are not used anymore,
awaiting disposal, and these will
not be removed until an effective
and attractive disposal scheme is
made available. The expectation
is that once such a system is in
place, a reasonably steady flow
of boats will require dismantling –
so a business opportunity would
seem to exist.
The study estimates that in
the next five years, 2.5% of the
recreational fleet will require
dismantling (12,500 boats),
followed by 5% of the fleet
between 2020-2025 (25,000
boats) and 7.5% between
2025-2030 (35,000 boats). This
predicted increase is based on
assumptions about the average
age of current boat owners,
together with the lack of interest
and financial capacity that
appears to exist for younger
generations to own a boat.
Looking forward and
avoiding repetition
So what is the answer to that vital
question, ‘what now?’ Well, it’s like
a football match – a game of two
halves. The first half must be a
continued and concerted effort by
the boating industry to address
end-of-life boat problems. This
can only be achieved by
continuing the good work already
embarked upon; sharing
information, developing practical
guidelines, exploring funding
options and showing legislative
authorities that the industry and its
users (boat owners, marinas,
yacht clubs) can pool resources
and work together across all
sectors to minimise the negative
impact of a historically-created
set of challenges.
The second half is to look boldly
and creatively towards the future.
It’s obvious that any responsible
industry would not wish to repeat
the mistakes of the past, but will
want to keep sharply in mind that
profitability and growth must be
achieved while adjusting to the
realities of a new world order that
demands higher standards of
environmental responsibility.
A second conference in
Amsterdam, booked for this
November as a follow-up to last
year’s ‘Future of yacht recycling’
seminar, is designed to enable
an exploratory exchange of ideas
and experiences from within the
industry. It will follow a logical
path through current trends in
recycling, user demographics and
life cycle assessment in boat
design and construction. It will
also look towards what is now
becoming the much-discussed
‘circular economy,’ an industrial
thought process that is the exact
antithesis of the ‘linear, take, make
and dispose’ model – the one
that has unfortunately left us with
millions of composite hulls that
cannot be disposed of very
satisfactorily under present
conditions. Entitled ‘Sustainability
in the marine industry’ the
conference will take place at
the start of METSTRADE at
Amsterdam RAI on Monday 14
November, with the headline
theme of ‘Profiting from
circular thinking.’
The industry needs to look
creatively towards the future
Practical Boat Owner 607 December 2016 • www.pbo.co.uk 21
End-of-life boats
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