Electric Tugboats; The Future?

I was going to say something about how forward-looking we are here in Vancouver, getting these electric tugs...

It turns out they're actually headed north, to Kitimat, where they'll mostly be used getting LNG carriers into and out of a new port and processing plant there.

That would be nothing new.
Diesel Electric Tugs have been around for ages, as were D.E. submarines.
These must be newer technology than that.

The breakthrough is the battery bank, its primary source of power.
The generators seem to be for emergency only, not for daily use.
Hat off to the designers and operators for being bold.

Other battery powered vessels:
https://www.fdiintelligence.com/content/feature/european-ferry-industrys-electric-dreams-83183#

Interesting thread for sure, Burger Boats is on the cutting edge of this vessel electrification trend and has been quiet about it so far as I can tell with minimum press releases, but they (Burger) have built two or three new Maids of the mist vessels for Hornblower Marine owner of the Niagra Falls tour boats that are all electric using ABB and Niad Dynamics equipment. ABB supplied the 400 kw azimuthing thrusters for propulsion and Niad for bow and stern thrusters. I believe these new maids have been in service for over two yrs. now. Seems reasonable to have electric driven vessels for short haul trips like short haul ferries going across fiords town to town but will be interesting when the hybrid concept of small ICE to recharge the battery systems underway for long haul scenarios. Time will tell.

The all-electric ship (AES) has historically been defined as one where all power generation is centralised and all loads electrified. As the largest power consumer is typically main propulsion, the AES would be powered by electric motors fed via the main distribution system.

Specialised vessels with unique requirements, e.g. military craft with high C4I or other operational demands, or cruise ships with very large hotel loads, etc, would ensure all loads are powered electrically, see link below.

The electrical source is most commonly a diesel-fuelled generator(s). The efficiency in this arrangement is achieved through matching power generation, both in quantity and thermodynamic efficiencies, to the instantaneous loading condition.

As several posts above have stated, this is not a new concept or technology. My opinion is that the difference between physical realities and marketing claims/advertisements should be made clear.

https://www.militaryaerospace.com/power/article/16709181/all-electric-ships

Yes, date of publication was one of the reasons I selected it. The idea was to give some background and technical rationale for the AES concept. The article does not mention batteries, supercapacitors or any other energy storage system.

It seems we're arguing the same point, along with a few others in the thread, that headlines and marketing fluff surrounding electric vehicles in general don't stand up to even moderate levels of scrutiny. Battery-powered marine craft much less so.

The reality is we have nothing remotely close to the energy density of diesel fuel or other petrochemical products for producing the on-demand power required in most ships, boats and other marine or land-based applications. Other than nuclear reactors.