Plastic waste is now found in the most remote areas of the planet. It kills marine life and is doing major harm to communities that depend on fishing and tourism.
For 60 years man has been putting plastic into the ocean. And from that day onward we're also taking it back out again.
Our beaches should not be garbage dumps. Our oceans must not be cesspools.
This indigested vomit of the Sea,Fell to the Dutch by Just Propriety.
When I was 16 years old, I went scuba diving in Greece and saw more plastic bags than fish. I wondered why we couldn't just clean it up. That rather simple question stuck in my head.
Taking care of the world's ocean garbage problem is one of the largest environmental challenges mankind faces today.
The concentration of plastic is rapidly increasing in the gyres. Even if you were to close off the tap, and no more plastic entered the ocean, that plastic would stay there, probably for hundreds of years.
On the face of it there is a pristine white sandy beach, but within an hour, around 100 of us can collect up to 250-300 kilos of rubbish. It's mostly bits of plastic, fishing line, nylon, bottle caps. We've found everything.
These garbage patches won't go away by themselves.
We think the fastest way to clean the ocean is to learn by doing.
We're starting with the North Pacific gyre simply because it is the largest accumulation of plastic.
