Auckland’s first hybrid electric commuter ferry, Waitematā One, will begin carrying passengers on the Devonport to downtown run in June, marking the first time a plug-in electric vessel has entered commercial service anywhere in New Zealand.
The 34.6 metre vessel completed its final on-water trials in the Waitematā Harbour on 27 May, and Auckland Transport says the boat will join the fleet within weeks. The Devonport route is one of the busiest commuter ferry services in the country, so the launch puts the new technology straight into a high-frequency, daily workload rather than easing it in on a quiet shoulder line. RNZ reported the trials were completed in the harbour on Wednesday afternoon.
Waitematā One was built by Q-West Boat Builders in Whanganui, designed by Australia-based naval architects Incat Crowther, and fitted with propulsion and control systems by Hamilton Jet in Christchurch. The vessel will be operated under contract for Auckland Transport by Fullers360.
The hull carries 299 seated passengers plus 20 bicycles, and the propulsion package draws on a 1944 kilowatt hour battery bank, four Danfoss electric motors and four Hamilton HTX42 waterjets. Two onboard diesel generators sit behind the batteries as a range-extending backup. The vessel reached 36 knots in all-electric mode during sea trials, well above its scheduled service speed of 12 knots and its maximum design speed of 28 knots.
Fullers360 chief executive Mike Horne told RNZ the diesel side of the system is deliberately conservative. “It’s an electric boat, but it’s also got a diesel hybrid back-up so if we don’t have power or there’s various things we need to do, then she can keep running all the time,” he said. The plug-in charging infrastructure at the downtown ferry terminal is still being built and is expected to be completed within the next 12 months, so for the first part of its working life Waitematā One will rely more heavily on its onboard generators to keep the batteries topped up.
Each vessel cost about $20 million. Auckland Council put up roughly 49 percent of the price, partly through the Climate Action Targeted Rate that ratepayers approved in 2022, with NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi covering the remaining 51 percent. A second hybrid ferry is under construction at the same Whanganui yard and is due to enter service later this year. Together the pair are expected to reduce carbon emissions from Auckland’s ferry network by 750,000 kilograms each year, roughly the annual exhaust output of 170 average petrol cars.
The economic case is largely about running costs rather than purchase price. Fullers360 testing suggests the new vessel can run on energy at about 70 to 75 percent lower cost than an equivalent diesel ferry when it is operating in electric mode. Diesel fast ferries are notorious fuel burners, and that gap is expected to widen as carbon costs feed through to bunker prices.
Wayne Brown, the Auckland mayor, has framed the rollout as part of a broader plan to lift the harbour from a sleepy commuter sideshow into a serious leg of the rapid transit network. The downtown terminal already handles more than five million passenger trips a year, with services running to Devonport, Half Moon Bay, Bayswater, West Harbour, Hobsonville and the Hauraki Gulf islands. Adding electric vessels to the busier routes, the council argues, makes the network more attractive to commuters who would otherwise sit in tunnel queues at peak hour.
Auckland Transport chief executive Stacey van der Putten has previously said each new vessel also pulls down the average age of the city’s ferry fleet, which has been a longstanding reliability issue. Several of the existing diesel ferries are more than 30 years old and have spent increasing amounts of time out of service for repairs over the past two summers.
Incat Crowther naval architect Dan Mace said in a written statement that the vessel “will offer Aucklanders a world-class, low-emission travel experience.” The hull has also been built with future hydrogen fuel cell compatibility, leaving the door open for Auckland Transport and Fullers360 to convert the boats away from diesel backup entirely if the local refuelling industry catches up.
The new ferry’s name nods to the harbour itself, with a second name yet to be confirmed for the sister vessel. Once both boats are in service later in 2026, the hybrid pair will run alongside the existing diesel fleet rather than replace it outright, but Auckland Transport has signalled that the next generation of ferries it orders will be fully electric.
For Auckland commuters who have grown used to cancelled sailings and ageing engines, the arrival of a quieter, cleaner ferry will be a noticeable change on the dawn run across the Waitematā. For the boat-building industry up the coast in Whanganui, the contract is a vote of confidence in domestic capacity to deliver complex hybrid vessels at scale.
The next test will be whether the new boats can hold their timetable through a winter of southerly squalls and big harbour chop. If they do, the case for a fully electric fleet on the city’s busiest commuter routes will be a great deal harder to argue against.
Have you ridden the Devonport ferry into work or town? What would make you switch from the car or the bus to the harbour service? Tell us in the comments.
This article was written by AI, briefed to report the facts, hopefully without some of the bias people bring to the job 🙂
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