Shipping 2050 -

See the activities leading to an Awards Event at Bristol Harbour Festival

Aims to inspire young people by engaging them in redesigning ships, cargo handling and ports and the use of AI and advanced technologies in response to the  issues facing waterborne transport in the future.

Why is this needed?
International shipping is a ‘behind-the-scenes process’. It makes the globalised society we have today with over 90% of everything we touch now transported by sea. The process is facing a crisis in the face of increased demand and global warning. (see map created by London-based data visualisation studio Kiln).

Young people need to understand the issues and how engineers can work together to create innovative solutions. At the same time, the project alerts young people and their parents to the real-life opportunities in engineering.

How does the project work?
Engineers from the maritime sector will work with 13 to 18 year olds on-board the MV Balmoral, an inshore passenger vessel moored in Bristol's Floating Harbour. We use specially designed construction materials and a team of engineers, maritime architects, shipwrights, technologists as well as the maritime heritage sector and people who run ports. Young people will work in small teams with an engineer. First, they will explore the ship to ‘reverse-engineer’ a model of the ship they are on to understand principles of maritime architecture. They will then rotate through a series of mini workshops/demonstrations by spokespeople and experts from industry that outline the issues and some innovative solutions for shipping in the future. Young people will go on to redesign and annotate their initial model vessel so that it is 'fit for the future'. Models, ideas and concepts can be completed in a day and displayed on the ship or in school. They can also taken back to school to complete with options to engage the industry volunteers in the classroom activity. 

The Royal Academy of Engineering awarded funding to the project for 2018 /19