The future is arriving on a barge

Capt Badar, the third generation of riverboat captains in his family, heads towards Paris with a load of shipping containers from Rouen, France. — ©2024 The New York Times Company

AS pale morning light flickered across the Seine, Capt Freddy Badar steered his hulking river barge, Le Bosphore, past picturesque Normandy villages and snow-fringed woodlands, setting a course for Paris.

Onboard were containers packed with furniture, electronics and clothing loaded the night before from a cargo ship that had docked in Le Havre, the seaport in northern France. Had the cargo continued by road, 120 trucks would have clogged the highways. Using Le Bosphore and its crew of four prevented tonnes of carbon emissions from entering the atmosphere.