Dutch courage: The Ocean Cleanup’s prototype being floated in the North Sea
The young Dutch inventor behind a groundbreaking project to remove millions of tonnes of plastic floating in vast ocean “garbage patches” unveiled the first prototype of his ambitious sea-cleaning device on Wednesday.
Boyan Slat’s innovative idea, first drawn on a paper napkin when he was still in high school, seeks to use ocean currents to gather up the masses of bottles, plastic bags, flip-flops and other detritus that sully the planet’s waters, eliminating the need for an army of boats to haul them in.
According to the Ocean Cleanup project, eight million tonnes of plastics enter the oceans every year, much of which has accumulated in five giant garbage patches, with the largest being in the Pacific between California and Hawaii.
The plastic “soup” is created when the rubbish gets caught up in five main “gyres”, or rotating oceanic currents.
But 21-year-old Slat believes he can harness the power of the currents to help the great clean-up.
“Why move through the ocean if the ocean can move through you?” Slat asked at a press conference in the harbour in the port of Scheveningen, on the outskirts of The Hague.
His idea is to use a 100km-long V-shaped barrier made up of large, pillow-shaped rubber buoys, which float on the ocean surface, trailing a 3m-long long curtain from the barrier’s arms into the water.
A 100m prototype was due to be taken to the North Sea on Thursday for a yearlong series of tests 23km off the Dutch coast.
The aim is to trap the plastic as it bobs along, gathering it all into one place so that it can be scooped up into a container and taken for recycling.
“All those plastic objects, big things like bottles, crates … will be cut down to micro pieces over the next few decades if we don’t do anything about it,” he told reporters as he explained the Ocean Cleanup.
“The question is: Is this a future we accept will happen, or do you want to create a future where the oceans become clean again?”
The micro pieces released as the plastics break down are dispersed throughout the seas, entering the food chain with harmful effects for all marine life. Turtles, fish, dolphins and other sea creatures can also become entangled in the rubbish or swallow pieces of it, believing it is food, which they then cannot digest.
The prototype has been built at a cost of €1.5-million, financed through crowdfunding and donations, including from the Dutch government.
Slat hopes to roll out the system fully in 2020 once the tests have been evaluated and necessary modifications made. He says his system could capture up to 3 000m3 of plastic in its arms — enough to fill an Olympic-sized swimming pool.
“With a single one of those systems deployed for 10 years, we should be able to clean up about half the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, or more if we could deploy more systems,” he told reporters.
Dutch Environment Minister Sharon Dijksma said it was “an inspiring example of how we can tackle the growing problem of ocean pollution”. The project was “crucial to prevent permanent damage to the environment and marine life”, she added.
The project’s most conservative estimate says that, in the first 10 years, 70-million kilograms of plastic will be removed.
The youngest-ever winner of the Champion of the Earth award (the United Nations’s highest environmental honour), Slat gave up his studies in aeronautical engineering to pursue his project.
Now the Ocean Cleanup has more than 40 staff, backed by dozens of volunteers. — AFP