Dock, stock and barrel: Meet the rocket engineer driving a sea change in shipping

It was hard to leave her dream job at ISRO. But Padmini Mellacheruvu, 30, is now framing rules to help massive ships switch to a clean fuel: hydrogen.

A return to wind in their sails is out of the question. So how are we to reduce the emissions footprint of the global shipping industry — which accounts for about 90% of the world’s goods movements, and about 3% of global greenhouse-gas emissions?

A 30-year-old from Andhra Pradesh is at the forefront of efforts to answer that question.

Last year, the United Nations International Maritime Organization announced that it will aim for net-zero greenhouse-gas emissions in this field by