Ingenious new ideas win environment innovation awards

The Ocean & Environment Innovation Awards are part of the initiative © TJV

The Transat Jacques Vabre aims to take its green credentials further than just being an environmentally friendly event. It also aims to be a platform for sustainability by using its influence and infrastructure to help others be more sustainable.

The Ocean & Environment Innovation Awards are part of the initiative

Five prizes have been won by a mix of students and start-ups for their new solutions to environmental problems. Every winner will be given practical business support from Transat Jacques Vabre stakeholders as well as mentoring from French Tech, a national movement for start-ups.

One winner was a start-up from Nouvelle-Aquitaine in western France. Maloric is developing giant kites for fishing boats with the aim of reducing their CO2 emissions. The president and founder Fabrice Jolivet sees access to Le Havre's marine industry as a game changer, "The fishing industry back home is still quite small. Le Havre has many trawlers over 15 metres so we'll be able to take advantage of this and also work with marine colleges."

Other winning projects from France involved developing a machine that can transform scallop shells into bio-waste, and a more efficient way of detecting wasteful water leaks in buildings.

There were two winners from Martinique, where the race will finish in mid-November. The Woulo Project is a system of buoys allowing the transformation of wave power into electricity. The ocean was also central to the other Martinican project. H2S Sargassum aims to transform sargassum algae that invade the coasts, into household products.