After an initial collaboration which led to Energy Observer 1 (based on the structure of Peter Blake’s Enza), which subsequently sailed 68,000 nautical miles between 2017 and 2024 as part of a worldwide campaign to raise awareness of solutions for energy independence, VPLP Design was commissioned by Victorien Erussard and his Energy Observer team to design the research vessel Energy Observer 3 in preparation for the 2025–2033 expedition A Journey to Carbon Neutrality.
Serving as an experimental boat, an expedition vessel and a venue for bringing people together, this catamaran cargo vessel has an aluminium hull, flies the French flag and possesses Bureau Veritas certification. She is much bigger than her predecessor (30 m long, 12 m beam, 125 tonnes displacement) with enough space to carry four Oceanwings for her propulsion without them encroaching on the living areas. In total, she can carry 18 people on deep sea voyages in comfortable conditions. This change of scale also allows the Energy Observer team to embark the energy technologies they have already identified, and to add or test others over time during port visits as they travel the globe.
Another particularity of EO3 is her ambition for total energy independence through 140 m² of solar panels on deck and, as an auxiliary power source, entirely carbon-free power produced from ammonia. The goal for this research vessel is to test clean energy solutions, paving the way for industrial and regulatory projects.
