ISOPOLAR AIRSHIPS
Encouraging the development of airship technology for sustainable transportation and logistics applications in northern latitudes.Welcome to ISO Polar Airships, a not-for-profit organization, that was founded in 2005 to encourage the use of cargo airships in Northern Canada. Like many new ideas, the rebirth of airship technology was met with skepticism and doubt. This seems to be changing as airship activity expands around the world and the need to access remote areas increases.
The economic impact of logistical challenges in the Northern latitudes is not much different in other remote areas in the topics or elsewhere. The cost of food, housing and just about everything else is three times higher than in urban areas because of infrastructure gaps. Cargo airships can provide a sustainable solution for the remote areas world-wide that reduces transportation costs and creates opportunities for economic development.
Climate change increases the need to embrace green technologies like airships. Unreliable ice roads and melting permafrost threaten land-based connections to remote communities. In other parts of the world, rising sea levels threaten coastal and island nations. Cargo airships are an appropriate green transportation technology to meet the needs of the 21st century.
What goes around comes around. Like windmills and electric cars, giant dirigibles were a used commercially in the 1930s. All three were replaced by cheaper fossil fuel competitors. Coal-fired electrical power plants replaced the windmills, gasoline-powered cars replaced electric cars, and kerosene-burning jet airplanes replaced the dirigibles. Science and engineering have turned the tables on carbon-based technologies. Electric cars and wind turbines are two of the fastest growing industries, and in some countries, their use is being mandated. It is only a matter of time before cargo airships experience a similar market renaissance because they can offer lower costs than competing airplanes and potentially zero carbon emissions.
ISO Polar serves as a clearinghouse to exchange information and to sponsor public events where new airship developments can be assessed. The organization also serves as a collective voice of the airship community to seek the cooperation and partnership with governments and supply chain participants.
LATEST AIRSHIP NEWS
A new generation of airships is taking to the skies
Rebecca Cairns, CNN The smooth, white underbelly of the airborne whale sails across the sky, casting a shadow across the forest below. Other than its enormous size, though, this “whale” has very little to do with its animal namesake. It’s an airship, and French aeronautics company Flying Whales hopes its hybrid-electric, helium-lift vessel will change […]
Hydrogen Airships: Potential International Difficulties
Airships have yet to reemerge as commercial transport, despite their numerous ecological, humanitarian, security, and business applications. A barrier for some business models is the regulation of lifting gasses. Regulations in many countries require airships to use helium to generate vertical movement, or lift. As supplies diminish, helium gas has become dramatically more expensive. When […]
The Coming Giant Airship Renaissance as an Investment Opportunity, Part 3
The first two posts in this series have described airship markets in general, and intercontinental shipping, emphasizing the scale of the opportunity. With that in view, we have two key messages for potential investors in airship ventures. The first is that high returns will come not from building airships per se, but from staking claims […]
The Coming Giant Airship Industry as an Investment Opportunity, Part 2
Post 1 in this series highlighted evidence that the world is on the verge of a giant airship renaissance. It stressed the wide range of market applications that make this an exciting investment opportunity. Here we drill down on intercontinental shipping where the potential demand is dramatic. An earlier post, “Airships in Intercontinental Shipping: The […]
Snow blindness: Airships in Canada’s northern transportation policy
This commentary by Barry Prentice examines the viability of cargo airships to address the northern transportation puzzle. By Barry Prentice ~ macdonaldlaurier.ca “If cargo airships are such a good idea for the North, why aren’t the skies filled with them?” This question was posed to me by the Macdonald-Laurier Institute a few months ago. It […]