The Ocean Clean Up: couldn’t be done until this 19 year old came along

Getting rid of of the millions of tons of plastic couldn’t be done the experts said until Boyan Slat thought outside of the box and created a concept which could do the job. Collecting the plastic with huge floating barriers, stretching over 100 kilometers while using the ocean currents as their input.

It took all of his time and he had to suspend his studies but he got the required 80.000 Euros to assemble a team of engineers and scientists and conclude a feasibility study.

Now the team is ready: it can be done and it should be done. We can’t accept an ocean where plankton is ‘outnumbered’ six to one by plastics. We need to stop the influx of plastics, but that won’t be enough: we need to get rid of our pollution to restore the oceans as the breeding grounds of species and the living area of earth.

All young Boyan’t team needs is 2 million to build a working model of their device and their crowdfunding campaign is already at 50%. Have a look at this inspirational video of their young leader and consider contributing to the smartest answer to a global problem.

http://www.theoceancleanup.com/
#sustainability #ecology #ThinkingOutsideOfTheBox #EverydayScience

This entry was posted in EveryDayScience and tagged , , , . Bookmark the permalink.

70 Responses to The Ocean Clean Up: couldn’t be done until this 19 year old came along

  1. Peter Harris says:

    one of the biggest tasks on the planet

  2. +Max Huijgen thanks for sharing this. Plussed, shared, and tweeted. Wonderful, well-executed idea.

  3. That 19 y/o guy is great… Not the one who doesn't exist…

  4. Joe Stier says:

    someone always has to something. God does exist and there aren't any words we know that could describe His greatness justly.

  5. Ganesh Nayak says:

    Thanks for sharing..

  6. Roger Lam says:

    +Max Huijgen, just backed and FB'd, nice to see OUR 17 year olds dream their way through intractability with simplicity, on a grand scale, for OUR only planet.

  7. Yay for this 19 year old…keeping our oceans clean -your our hero…the plastic waste in the ocean is affecting our life sustaining elements.

  8. simba mhizha says:

    Lets give that boy a pam pam. Yu are intelligent boy.

  9. Fantastic. Bravo and you ve got my support. Now big companies must show they really care and fund the cleanup. How about companies like Princecraft, Bombardier Seadoo, etc.

  10. Permagrin187 says:

    Easiest decision ever.

  11. +Stephane Jargaille of course 'others' can fund… :-

    'Support' doesn't clean one gram of plastic. Or did you support by donating a few €/$?

    (didn't want to be personal, but I started to get a bit grumpy over time after realising that 'liking', 'sharing' & 'plussing' doesn't gets those things done)

  12. Julian Bond says:

    I don't know what to think about this.

    This criticism rings true to me. Not least because of the "The Ocean is BIG" view.
    http://inhabitat.com/the-fallacy-of-cleaning-the-gyres-of-plastic-with-a-floating-ocean-cleanup-array/

    And yet, so does this study.
    http://inhabitat.com/19-year-olds-ocean-cleanup-array-could-clean-half-the-pacific-garbage-patch-in-10-years-study-shows/

    Maybe the most worthwhile part of this is to highlight the problem and encourage mankind to stop throwing stuff into the ocean where it's out of sight, out of mind.

  13. Permagrin187 says:

    +Stephane Jargaille This is the first thing I thought about and the last thing I would ever consider a reality, thus, major corporations donating/assisting with the problem they have tried to "bury in the ocean" for the last 100+ years. That's exactly why I donated.

  14. Julian Bond says:

    Thanks for pointing to that.

  15. Jay Geater says:

    thanks for sharing this

  16. Supported with a €5 donation. If we all add just a small amount we get it funded in no-time!

  17. Madcat40 says:

    Totally deserves a Nobel prize

  18. ปปปปปปคครร่ปปปปป

  19. Keep up the good work, keep fighting the good fight. Maybe our high profile scientific think-tanks, need to pay for this "kids'" PhD, and pay him.

  20. +Stephane Jargaille ….and Monsanto, Pepsico, bottled water conglomerates, toy manufacturers…ad infinitum, ad nasueum…a list too huge to contemplate without throwing up.

  21. Faith in humanity restored…

  22. essien nkana says:

    This Oscar too sweet to see a young guy aspiring

  23. What a wonderful thing this kid has done for the world we all have to live in ~

  24. This little dutch boy has his finger in the dyke

  25. Stop eating the catfish, shrimp, lobsters/ shellfish n the oceans will clean themselves. I applaud this young man, however the Most High God already had a system set up to clean the ocean. Leave the unclean animals in the water alone and they'll get back to their purpose

  26. 1809Cookie1 says:

    Sadly, catfish, shrimp, lobster and other shellfish, cannot eat plastic. Nothing can. That's the big problem.

  27. Matt P says:

    I bet Shoenice can eat plastic.

  28. Keith Franks says:

    Hats off to that kid, a genius idea. Now how to stop the pollution in the first place. It takes a plastic water bottle at least 1000 years to brake down.

  29. Ron Carter says:

    Most high god??? He created certain fish to eat plastic?? That is incredible.

  30. Where did i say that? I said lobsters, catfish and shellfish to clean the
    ocean. Pls don't add things

  31. Keith Franks says:

    Daniel Burd, a student at Waterloo Collegiate Institute, recently demonstrated that certain types of bacteria can break down plastic. His research earned the top prize at the Canada-wide Science Fair,

  32. That is great but what about the plastics then…. how do they manage the dirt from the see??????

  33. Sorry I meant….. from the SEA

  34. Eventually Waves push things back to shore. However its good that the man's
    cleaning it up. Point is, the trash in the sea can be cleaned by the
    scavengers of the sea. Just like the earth can be cleaned by the scavengers
    of the earth, like the SWINE/PIG, VULTURES ETC.. So in this case if we
    leave the scavengers of the sea alone, they can do their job. Whatever they
    don't get, the waves will eventually push it to shore and man can walk to
    the shore and pick it up. It all works hand in hand. Message in this is to
    eating the unclean animals

  35. LevKozlodoev says:

    It's not surprising that big corporations full of brilliant people couldn't figure it out – they simply couldn't give a dusty fuck about the ocean.

  36. Ken Shields says:

    The Oceans are the reasons we're breathing

  37. Help spread the wordand share on every social media site possible, this NEEDS to happen!

  38. Max Huijgen says:

    +Keith Franks in case you were wondering where your comments went: they were deleted by Google, but I restored them when I noticed.

  39. Mel.w Wa says:

    That's really something .It took the right person.

  40. I gave a speech at Toastmasters on the problem a year ago. Thrilled that something is being done about it. In favor of getting rid of all the single use plastic we waste in the USA. We need to stop being selfish about our resources.

  41. Great thinking. I hope it works.

  42. Akoth Effy says:

    no matter how much the dark may be, the dawn will always break

  43. +1809Cookie1 Это точно, и срок его утилизации тысячи лет.

  44. Thank you, you are one in million

  45. Akoth Effy says:

    we should always appreciate God for bringing us this far

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *