Grain de Sail, a French sail cargo company and chocolatier, has unveiled its most ambitious project yet: the Grain de Sail III, a significantly larger sail cargo ship designed to enhance its operations. With a capacity of 200 TEU (approximately 2,800 metric tons), this new vessel aims to scale up the company’s sustainable maritime transport by introducing up to four ships by 2027.
The Grain de Sail III will be a 360-foot container ship capable of crossing the Atlantic in about 13 days, primarily powered by wind, with supplementary power for port and channel maneuvers. A wood pellet boiler will provide heat and hot water for the crew.
Oliver Barreau, Co-Founder and President of Grain de Sail, stated, “With Grain de Sail III, we are demonstrating our ambitions and solidifying our leadership in the decarbonized maritime transport segment. To make wind-powered transport accessible, we need to change scale, and that’s exactly what we’re doing.”
The ship’s design features a sail area of over 43,000 square feet (4,000 square meters), three masts, and large rigid sails, all optimized for its size. Its maximum air draft of 205 feet (62.5 meters) will enable it to navigate under major maritime bridges, while retractable daggerboards will enhance upwind performance and reduce draft at the dock.
This expansion is projected to reduce the company’s carbon footprint by over 90%, with emissions as low as 1 to 2 grams of CO2 per ton of cargo transported per kilometer—10 to 20 times lower than conventional shipping methods.
Grain de Sail, which started operations in 2020 with a small sailboat carrying just 50 tons, originally focused on transporting French goods to New York, then sourcing organic cocoa and green coffee from Latin America. With the launch of its second vessel, Grain de Sail II, earlier this year—a 52-foot ship with a capacity of 350 tons—the company is now expanding its services to include transportation for other shipping customers.
This move aligns with a growing trend in sustainable cargo operations under sail. Notably, in August 2024, French carrier TOWT launched its largest sail cargo vessel, Anemos, with a capacity of 1,000 tons, also offering services between France, New York, the Caribbean, and South America. As Grain de Sail continues to scale up, it is well-positioned to play a pivotal role in the evolving landscape of eco-friendly maritime transport.
