The Earth 300 is an ambitious scientific project aimed at raising awareness about climate change all while doubling up as a luxury research vessel funded in part by billionaire guests, according to a report by the BBC's Science Focus.
Slated to launch in 2024, the Earth 300 megayacht will contain 22 laboratories and will carry 450 passengers, including scientists, environmentalists, and a few billionaires for good measure.
The 300m long vessel will include a 13-story 'science sphere,' in which the entrepreneur behind the project, Aaron Olivera, aims to get some of the world's best scientists to collaborate on climate change solutions, using high-end technology aboard the ship.
The idea is to sell space aboard the vessel to the rich and put 80 percent of the profits back into the science being conducted aboard the ship. Luxury apartments will be available, meaning the wealthy can contribute to science in more ways than one.
Among the technology available to the scientists aboard the ship will be robotics, artificial intelligence software, built-in sensors, and the world's first commercial, seafaring quantum computer to process the huge amounts of data collected aboard the ship, reports Interesting Engineering.
The Earth 300 vessel is planned to be zero-emission, running on nuclear energy from an onboard molten salt reactor based on technology from the Bill Gates-backed TerraPower, which is yet to be fully developed.
If the ideas behind Earth 300 sound a bit mad, that's because perhaps they are - little specific information has been revealed about the type of research that would be carried out aboard the megayacht. Still, Olivera claims that the project, whose findings will be open source, has the potential to help humanity reach its crucial climate change goals in the coming years.