Earlier this year I attended the world’s largest Marine Equipment Trade Show in Amsterdam. METS is a truly colossal exhibition, dwarfing the likes of the Tullett Prebon London Boat Show.

There were 1,250 exhibitors of which 150 featured in the Super Yacht Pavilion. You could buy anything for a boat ranging from helicopter pads, Jacuzzis or simply a cleat. Miles were walked in search of the elusive prize of a product that you were actually interested in. Between the hundreds of carbon fibre gadgets I found a few gems.

Wavestream, one our very own UK companies launched a new grey water filter system for boats of 40-feet plus. It is great in that all the contaminants will be removed from your grey water so you can either reuse the water or pump it out into the environment knowing that there will not be any detrimental effects. Wavestream also have similar systems for your bilge which we encourage all boaters to fit.

I have noticed on my travels to inland marinas that some of them look as though they have been astro turfed around the boats as the weed is so thick. This in part is due to high nitrogen build up in the water and this can be attributed to all the grey water being discharged with nitrates in it from washing up liquid and other cleaning products.

It was good to see a number of cleaning products for boaters which had been designed specifically to reduce the impact on the environment whilst still achieving the same results. Obviously cleaning a 100-metre super yacht requires a lot of product (as well as a lot of elbow grease) and so there is pressure to ensure that this doesn’t cause any adverse effects on the local area. Hopefully more of these environmentally sensitive cleaners and products will end up on the UK market.

A German company (EFOY) was showing off some super-efficient fuel cells which utilises methanol to extract hydrogen making it easier and safer to transport and store than the hydrogen cells that are on the market. It was noticeable that there were a high number of hybrid (electric) engines being developed as well as hydrogen fuel cell technologies.

This was very useful as I was attending the show with two members of the Royal Thames Yacht Club who were launching and drumming up entrants for their hybrid propulsion award; The Mansura Trophy. The competition already attracts entrants from boat builders and engine manufacturers at the cutting edge of hybrid technology from all over the world. I particularly like the look of a new J Class Yacht being built by the Dykstra yard named Rainbow which will have a hybrid engine fitted.

One of the reasons The Green Blue is getting involved is to disseminate the advantages that Hybrids offer. I have seen first-hand how many people were impressed with Jeremy Rogers own Contessa 32 ‘Calypso’ at the Southampton Boat show 2010. I will be bringing updates to All at Sea readers as well as through the RYA newsletters, so watch this space. While at the show I also had the opportunity to meet with some of the other national trade associations who face some of the same environmental issues that we have and some have even more issues than us! Out of all the countries I spoke with, the UK is unique in having an environmental initiative which is part of both the governing body and the trade association.

Some excellent knowledge sharing took place and the Australian governing body was particularly interesting as they have had to deal with some issues which are only just starting to affect us.