Hiswa, the Dutch industry organisation, the local water sports association, the Maritime Industry Association and the scrapping company Het Harpje from Enkhuizen also asked themselves this question. Together, they commissioned a study with the support of funding from the Ministry of Infrastructure. This was then carried out by Waterrecreatie Advies, an institute specialising in water sports.
The result: the 500,000 boats together weigh around 900,000 tonnes. 286,000 tonnes of this is polyester, for which, unlike steel or wood, there is still no conclusive recycling concept. According to the study, as soon as such a concept is developed, the number of boats to be disposed of will increase. This is because it will then be easier to get rid of an old ship. Today, around 100,000 ships are sitting unused in barns - because the owners don't know what to do with them.
Another problem is the increasing number of abandoned boats; one in four marinas is already struggling with this. The value of the boats is often even negative due to accrued demurrage. Selling them, let alone disposing of them, would cost a lot of money. The result: the owner leaves the boat where it is, to its fate.
In addition, the study concludes that demographic trends also require a coherent disposal concept: when the baby boomer generation (born in the 1960s) stops enjoying water sports, up to 35,000 boats will have to be disposed of every year. However, this will probably not be the case until the thirties of this century. By then, however, a functioning recycling chain must be in place.
The findings of the study can also be more or less applied to Germany. This is because the population development in Germany is very similar to that of its neighbours in the west. However, the number of boats per inhabitant is significantly lower, which is solely due to the fact that there are proportionally fewer water areas in Germany than in the Netherlands.
An example from the automotive industry: manufacturers have had to guarantee the take-back and disposal of their vehicles for years due to legal requirements. As a result, they have increasingly switched to recyclable materials. Whether and how this can be transferred to the water sports industry is still an open question.
