Earth 300 Facebook
- The Earth 300 ship is designed to be emission-free and powered by nuclear energy.
- Aaron Olivera, CEO of Earth 300, wants to bring the "brightest and smartest" scientists aboard.
- The ship is planned to set sail in 2025 with 160 scientists and 40 VIP guests.
- See more stories on Insider's business page.
You can hitch a 10-day ride on a nuclear-powered, emission-free yacht for the price of $3 million, or take the trip for free if you're a lucky student or scientist selected to be on board to help study the effects of climate change.
The yacht, called the Earth 300, will be a global icon for science, according to the website. The current plan is for it to set sail in 2025 with 160 scientists on board from a variety of disciplines, 20 students, 165 staff, and 40 VIP guests who can pay $3 million for their ticket to ride along.
Aaron Olivera, chief executive officer of Earth 300, told Money FM he thought of the yacht and voyage in 2015, when he went scuba diving in the Maldives and saw the dead coral, killed by the over-acidification in the ocean.
He then came up with he idea to bring the "brightest and smartest" scientists aboard a new-age ship to work together to come up with solutions to climate change.
The design of the ship, which will be powered by safe and sustainable atomic energy from a Molten Salt Reactor, has 22 "cutting-edge" laboratories, with artificial intelligence, robotics, machine learning, real-time data processing, and the latest quantum computer, according to the website.
"It's state-of-the-art science at sea," Olivera said on Money FM on April 9.
The vessel has a sleek look. It's 300 meters long, which is about three-and-a-third football fields, by 46 meters wide, translating to about one-and-a-half basketball courts, by 60 meters tall at its highest, or about the height of an 18-story building.
"It's a vessel that's got the overall size of a cruise ship but it's not a cruise ship; it's got the overall look of a superyacht, but it's not a superyacht," Olivera said on the radio show. "It's got the technology to rival an aircraft carrier, but it's not an aircraft carrier. It's going to have the endurance and the exploration skills of an explorer vessel, but it's not an explorer vessel. It's all of those put together in one package."
Earth 300 Facebook page
Prior to founding Earth 300, Olivera was the president of Falcon Royal Yachts, helping to create two luxury megayachts designed by Porsche, according to his LinkedIn profile. Before that, he worked at Corporate Grand, creating elite dining and entertainment experiences for the ultra-wealthy.
The CEO has "experiences in a myriad of industries, from training and development, to publishing, hospitality, retail and yachting," according to his bio on the Earth 300 website.
When asked why he decided to create a ship to be the vessel for studying climate change, Olivera said, "The oceans are the beating heart of the planet. Without oceans there can not be any life."
The proposal still has a ways to go, though.
Olivera has already funneled $5 million into the design, and European and South Korean shipyards are likely to carry out the construction, according to reporting from Entrepreneur. The news site said the total cost of the ship would be about $500 million to $700 million, with some funding coming from private investors.
"The idea was to design an object that would be able to capture everybody's imaginations on a global scale," Olivera said on Money FM, adding that, "There's nothing like this."