19-Year-Old Develops Ocean Cleanup Array That Could Remove 7,250,000 Tons Of Plastic From Oceans

[babylonsister]

19-Year-Old Develops Ocean Cleanup Array That Could Remove 7,250,000 Tons Of Plastic From Oceans
Tuesday, March 26, 2013



19-year-old Boyan Slat has unveiled plans to create an Ocean Cleanup Array that could remove 7,250,000 tons of plastic waste from the world’s oceans.

The device consists of an anchored network of floating booms and processing platforms that could be dispatched to garbage patches around the world. Instead of moving through the ocean, the array would span the radius of a garbage patch, acting as a giant funnel.

The angle of the booms would force plastic in the direction of the platforms, where it would be separated from plankton, filtered and stored for recycling.

At school, Boyan Slat launched a project that analyzed the size and amount of plastic particles in the ocean’s garbage patches. His final paper went on to win several prizes, including Best Technical Design 2012 at the Delft University of Technology. Boyan continued to develop his concept during the summer of 2012, and he revealed it several months later at TEDxDelft 2012.

Slat went on to found The Ocean Cleanup Foundation, a non-profit organization which is responsible for the development of his proposed technologies. His ingenious solution could potentially save hundreds of thousands of aquatic animals annually, and reduce pollutants (including PCB and DDT) from building up in the food chain. It could also save millions per year, both in clean-up costs, lost tourism and damage to marine vessels.

more...

http://www.whydontyoutrythis.com/2013/03/19-year-old-student-develops-ocean-cleanup-array-that-could-remove-7250000-tons-of-plastic-from-the-worlds-oceans.html#sthash.GwSuG7zd.BePsr7ov.dpbs

[PDJane]

1. Let's get it moving and deployed. This planet wants help, and this is a start.

[shenmue]

2. Wow, that looks awesome! Nobel Prize alert!

Also, it looks liks something out of a Doctor Who episode. Extra cool points.

[Kelvin Mace]

3. Not going to be deployed

because no one will be able to make a buck on it.

[rwsanders]

20. I agree, but...

I'm hoping that a kid this brilliant will eventually make money somewhere else and come back and build it himself.
It is the most hopeful video I've seen in a while.

[Kelvin Mace]

44. Hopefully enough money to actually implement his idea

Loves your avatar. Spinach eatin' sailors don't get much respek these days and thatsa fak.

[truebluegreen]

21. There's money in recycling, dude.

Speaking as someone (living abroad) who owns a plastics recycling company and ships his product to North America and China. The toxic soup is conveniently located in between...

[JDPriestly]

39. Recycling stuff covered with salt water.

They will have to find a way to rinse of the salt water first. And most of the stuff will end up in landfills -- which are already filled to brimming. We need to produce less trash especially plastic bags and bottles.

[truebluegreen]

42. Well, I agree we need to produce less trash,

but it is not that hard to process the stuff. Even the product we get locally has to be cleaned.

We collect plastic of all kinds, but principally bottles; sort it, grind it into flake, then wash it (which is neither as difficult nor as resource intensive as you might think) and sell it to companies that manufacture new things, from clothing to manhole covers. This is a growth industry, as it should be, and even our minor efforts have gone a long way towards cleaning up our area (even our relatively small municipality produces a staggering amount of trash every week, and 10% of it is plastic).

[JDPriestly]

65. I understand. I compost. I recycle.

We don't fill our trash bin every week. We only fill it every once in a while.
So I understand the recycling angle.

But what happens to all the salt?

You may clean a lot of stuff off your recycled trash, but the ocean trash will be covered with salt water that will evaporate and leave a lot of salt.

They could wash it off with river water and let all that water and salt flow into the ocean, but that would be very expensive.

You can't just deposit that much salt somewhere. It is very bad for the soil. And you wouldn't want to sell it as sea salt for eating or cooking because it won't be clean enough since it has been on the trash.

What would you do with it?

[lumberjack_jeff]

57. The problem is less the salt water than the barnacles and other sea life.

The sustainable-energy fix is easy and doesn't require a bunch of arbitrary technology.

Sailing craft using floating booms can actively capture far more material than the techno-manta-thingee can capture passively... even if it were possible to anchor in 4000' of water.

The problem is paying people to sail the boat to collect plastic having zero value. It's a money problem.

Setting aside other problems, how would an unmanned craft, powered by solar panels deal with this?

[Kelvin Mace]

45. Yeah, but the cost of deploying and retrieving

this thing is going to kill any profit margin. Used to be governments would do this as a project for the common good, but not any more.

[truebluegreen]

46. You know how much this will cost, and what the profit margin is?

And you know the things can't change?

[Kelvin Mace]

55. If we can't sell alternate energy sources

to a world rapidly running out of oil, I don't think we are going to sell this type of project, even if it were profitable.

The powers that be do NOT CARE about what happens to the planet, because they know that only the poor will suffer, not them or theirs.

[truebluegreen]

56. I agree. TPTB do NOT care, and won't, until they do.

Which means we have to make them.

Never say never.

[Scootaloo]

61. "TPTB?" Don't kid yourself, PEOPLE don't care

it's not some evil cabal of smirking slimy assholes sniffing their wallets. It's the horde of seven billion completely apathetic motherfuckers carpeting the world. Okay, okay, not completely apathetic, but very, very bubbled. Most of the human beings on this planet are looking towards the end of today, what they can bring home for their families, and what they have to have ready by tomorrow morning. That's it. And that's the problem with these huge world-threatening problems. They're so big and so long-term that most people can't see them, and people who are informed are simply overwhelmed by the size of the issue, and so they ignore it because it's easier. And let's not pretend that we're any different because we talk about it - I'm not scooping plastic out of the pacific or inventing some way to bond mercury from mine tailings into a harmless resin, are you? No, we're just here talking, two more apes in the herd who see the problem and can't do much more than hoot. And so long as we're just hooting, the people at the head of the herd aren't going to care either.

[truebluegreen]

63. Whatever.

But no, I at least am not one of the "apes in the herd." See my posts above.

Have a good day.

[truebluegreen]

64. P.S. "seven billion completely apathetic....bubbled...."

I submit, not "bubbled", not "apathetic"...try "unknowing" and "unable". Yes, far too many of that 7 billion are just trying to feed their families and have no time or energy for more. A famous historian (the first one, actually) said (more or less) that men's morals sink to the same level as their means. Centuries later a philosopher added that "ought" implies "can", or to say that someone ought to do something implies that he can do it.

Unfortunately you and I DO know better, and I at least have some means to apply to the problem. You OUGHT to drop the effing Can't-Do attitude and do what you can.

Or not. But if not, STFU. One man's opinion.

[Scootaloo]

66. Oh spare me.

"Thinking positive" is just a prayer for the agnostic. Attitude doesn't count for shit, action does.

[truebluegreen]

67. Wasn't talking about the Power of Positive Thinking. Or religion (WTF?).

I was talking about not starting with the assumption that nothing can be done.

But whatever. Have a nice life.

[grahamhgreen]

35. Hater

[Autumn Colors]

47. The company, Method, should team up with him

They make eco-friendly cleaning products and now have some products in containers made from recycled plastic from the ocean. This sounds like a match made in heaven.

http://methodhome.com/ocean-plastic/

[libodem]

4. Cool

Good on him.

[Xipe Totec]

5. Wicked Cool! nt

[malaise]

6. See one is blowing up people and another is saving our oceans

Hope he has the patent

[Voice for Peace]

31. my same thought - two 19-year-olds, different outcomes

[Demoiselle]

7. News coming just in time to renew my faith in humanity.

...Er, my faith in SOME humanity...

[silverweb]

8. OK, picture this.

[font color="navy" face="Verdana"]A group of repurposed deep-water oil rig platforms housing solar/wind/tide-powered thermal depolymerization plants, with fleets of these skimmers bringing ocean trash to the intake ports.

Resulting crude oil product could be shipped to refineries, as usual, for the full range of petroleum-based products.

The oil industry could also be a cleanup operation, not a maker of more toxic messes. How about it Exxon? BP? Shell? Anyone?

[rwsanders]

23. I was intrigued by the quote on your signature line and had to look up Wendell Berry...

Just on wikipedia and it appears he was an amazing person. With him around how did rural america go right?
Anyway, is there a particular book of his you highly recommend?

[silverweb]

25. He IS an amazing person!

[font color="navy" face="Verdana"]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wendell_Berry

What one would consider his best works (books, articles, essays, poetry) kind of depends on what one's interests are. Berry has covered everything from the death penalty to abortion to agriculture to philosophy and then some. I've read some of his work over the years and loved it all, but have no particular favorites. Probably should read more of it.

I'd recommend just checking the bibliography in the Wikipedia article, pick what subject appeals to you most, and go from there.

Here's his website, if you haven't bookmarked it already: http://www.wendellberrybooks.com

[JDPriestly]

40. Thanks. I'll check on some of the books.

[kestrel91316]

26. Wendell Berry is an American treasure! I have several of his books - among them is a signed

copy of The Gift of Good Land in hardback, which is pretty much unavailable anywhere even unsigned. Jealous??? LOL

[TinkerTot55]

9. Mr Slat.....

...you're my Hero.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

10. This is what happens when all the best minds go to Wall Street...

We have to depend on kids who haven't been bought yet to think.

[SunSeeker]

11. Very cool. Thanks for the post. nt

[Triana]

12. That's the kind of stuff 19-year-olds ought to be doing

instead of bombing the shit out of innocent people in public places.

[Amonester]

70. YES! (nt)

[toby jo]

13. Wow. The kid figures this could save hundreds of thousands of marine animals/year.

It would take 5 years to clean up the oceans. The rest of us feel completely overwhelmed and the kid goes, 'well, here ya go.'

Love it.

[valerief]

14. But can rich people get richer off it? That's all that matters no matter how cool or clever the

design is.

[SharonAnn]

30. Sure, if they get government to fund it and then "wire" the contract awarding process.

The usual way.

[ReRe]

15. Great news, babylonsister...

K&R

... we need to realize that not everything has been invented yet. Bless the people with imaginations big enough to solve some of our most serious problems on this earth. Back in my time, we thought of "changing the world." In your time, you need to think of "saving the world!" Go for it, youngins'! You rock!

[caballojm]

16. Not cool!

This flies in the face of my God-given right to pollute this 10,000 year old Earth as I see fit!

[panader0]

17. This could be a profitable business

Perhaps that will stir some capitalists.

[NealK]

18. That's awesome!

Brilliant kid.

[Sekhmets Daughter]

19. So impressive on so many levels!

The gift of cleaning the oceans is wonderful. That a 19-year-old should come up with this idea and then develop it is amazing!

Perhaps there is still hope!

[n2doc]

22. Nice computer rendering

No chance it will work. I suspect the kid has never been on the open ocean. But he is a good promoter.

[Aristus]

51. No chance the Apollo spacecraft would work, either.

They were designed and built by people who had never been in space. So you've got something there.

What's the point of even trying?...

[Politicalboi]

53. LOL!

I love those people. It won't work, so stop trying. Now we need someone to come up with a way to cool the oceans using the sun to run it.

[lumberjack_jeff]

58. Except people have been sailing the oceans for thousands of years

and are available, should well-intentioned inventors care to ask them, to provide advice.

[Aristus]

59. And it's that kind of experience, coupled with vision and tenacity,

that can lead to profound progress and a brighter future for all.

Think of all the good things we have today that were produced despite a litany of "it-will-never-work" remarks.

[lumberjack_jeff]

60. Sometimes pipe dreams are just pipe dreams.

There are dozens of insurmountable problems with his idea; bycatch, survivability, reliability, a 4000' long anchor rode and economics are just a few.

http://inhabitat.com/the-fallacy-of-cleaning-the-gyres-of-plastic-with-a-floating-ocean-cleanup-array/

[pnwmom]

24. Great idea -- but then what? What do we do with all the old plastic? n/t

[Champion Jack]

27. Recycle, reuse

[lumberjack_jeff]

28. This concept has been discussed at length by boat designers

The general consensus is that the idea is fundamentally flawed.

http://www.boatdesign.net/forums/boat-design/boyan-slat-concept-boat-46749.html
http://inhabitat.com/the-fallacy-of-cleaning-the-gyres-of-plastic-with-a-floating-ocean-cleanup-array/

[The Wielding Truth]

36. Thanks for the link. Interesting fact:

http://inhabitat.com/the-fallacy-of-cleaning-the-gyres-of-plastic-with-a-floating-ocean-cleanup-array/

The good news

Here’s something that will blow your mind—to clean the ocean of floating plastic, you don’t need to go out and get it, it will come to you. Yep, that’s right. Oceanographer Curtis Ebbsmeyer, author of, Flotsametrics describes a rarely talked about phenomena that occurs naturally in the ocean called Gyre Memory. Gyre Memory demonstrates that upon each orbit of a gyre, the gyre will spit out about half its contents. These contents will then either enter another current or gyre or wash up on land. As this repeats, it means that eventually, all the plastic in the ocean will be spit – out which is why you find plastic fragments on every beach in the world. Beach cleanup is gyre cleanup.

Read more: The Fallacy of Cleaning the Gyres of Plastic With a Floating "Ocean Cleanup Array" | Inhabitat - Sustainable Design Innovation, Eco Architecture, Green Building

[zipplewrath]

41. Slight technical fallacy

If they spit out half with every revolution, it will never spit it all out. Partially you'll be spitting stuff back and forth between gyres. In reality though, that equation probably doesn't hold true as the magnitude of the gyres decreases. Somewhere you probably achieve some sort of equilibrium where it doesn't spit out any more than it takes in. Sooner or later you're gonna have to go get the stuff. Although by then you may not care enough to go.

I'm reminded of an old joke from engineering school.

A physicist, a mathematician, and an engineer are entered into a contest. At one end of a room they place the three in chairs. It is a very long room with lines marked off in increments. At the other end, they place the worlds most beautiful woman. The three are told they can approach her, but only by reducing the distance between them by half or less with each step in her direction. The bell sounds and the engineer takes off. The physicists and the mathematician stay seated. When queried, the physicist explains that it is pointless, approaching by half will never allow you to get to the other end of the room, you'll always fall short. The mathematician nods his head in agreement. The engineer, still moving quickly across the room announces, "I can get close enough!".

[The Wielding Truth]

50. Although this is an interesting view. I do agree that this will not do it all. Even (if) this

natural flow did move most of the junk on shore eventually, there is still the problem of the continued deposit of inorganic matter and the junk that has sunk. Of course there is more that must be done. Incineration on shore also has problems. I like that idea of a natural and scientific fix.

Point taken. It is good to have those who will just do and not over think the problem. Yet, it is also wise that problems be studied.

[zipplewrath]

54. Best point made

A great point made in the article is that one problem with trying to collect all this junk, is that it is entering the water at faster and faster rates. Collecting the trash doesn't work if it piles up faster than you collect it. We've got to stop the inflow, and then we can work on a VARIETY of ways to get the the legacy material. To some extent nature will "fix" this ultimately if we can stop the inflow.

[Amonester]

29. INDIEGOGO project FUNDRAISING LINK in reply:

http://igg.me/at/the-ocean-cleanup

Almost completely reached!

[Autumn Colors]

68. Goal reached! :) (nt)

[Amonester]

69. Awesome news, thanks!!!! (nt)

[iamthebandfanman]

32. something ive always pondered

..
I remember hearing about that floating garbage sometime around 11 or 12 maybe? doing something for a 'conservation week' at school..(darn socialist programs, lol) ..
and thinking to myself..
'why has no one done something about that?'

I was just one of the millions who left it at that I guess .. just a question, with no answers... I assumed surely someone was working on it...

Sad its taken this long..

Even more sad that itll probably never be realized unless built from donations...

Where theres no profit, theres no love from money...

[joanbarnes]

33. Awesome. Thank You! There IS hope.

[dembotoz]

34. favorite tom lehrer quote--when beetoven was my age he had been dead for 5 years

go kid go

[usafvet65]

37. It appears the Great Lakes could use this technology too.

http://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=Great+lakes+floating+plastic+garbage&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

[JDPriestly]

38. And where does he plan to put the trash once he has scooped it up?

[Amonester]

43. In my neck of the woods, we put most plastics in our green recycle bin

which is picked up once a week by city-union workers, so maybe most of it will go the same road? (Hope so...)

[gussmith]

48. Wow! Thank You

Great to hear great news about a nineteen-year old. Not to conflate the two at all but I am so pleased to rebound from Boston's creep with news of a dedicated, thinking and caring young American. Thank you Boyan Slat for caring about the oceans we are mistreating.

[ConcernedCanuk]

49. It's amazing how stupid the human race is, especially the "white" man

.
.
.

We managed to pollute the "Great Lakes" in a couple of centuries, dumping raw shit into it, then wondering why we can't drink it, or even swim in it safely in some areas.

We haven't learned a thing really, companies respond only to outrage, and still cut corners.

Look at our tar sands here in Canada.

The tailing ponds leak constantly, poisoning the land and rivers surrounding them, never mind the fact we raped the land of its forests and soil, homes for numerous wild-life species just to grab oil to sell to the USA at less than $1 a barrel

Momma nature will be happy when we destroy ourselves, and then the trees will grow, the rivers run clear and the wild-life will return and make a better job of restoring "the balance of nature".

CC

[XemaSab]

52. Most of the plastic eaten by albatrosses on Midway

comes from China.

[Bill USA]

62. recommended!!