How to Eliminate the Great Pacific Garbage Patch

by | Aug 7, 2018

How to Eliminate the Great Pacific Garbage Patch

by | Aug 7, 2018

https://pixabay.com/en/guise-waste-line-costs-coast-beach-1533852/

According to Science magazine, about 8 million metric tons of land-based plastic, including plastic straws, ends up in the world’s oceans each year. This is equivalent to five grocery bags of plastic on every foot of coastline around the world. More than a quarter of ocean plastic likely originates from only 10 rivers, eight of them in Asia. Marine life is vulnerable to the health risks posed by plastic debris.

The majority of ocean plastic ends up in gyres, systems of circular ocean currents. The largest gyre is home to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, an area estimated by some to be three times the size of California, located halfway between Hawaii and California in the Pacific Ocean.

Conventional methods of cleaning the ocean are prohibitively slow and costly. But a new venture launched from Alameda allows nature to do the legwork.

Ocean Cleanup is a nonprofit group founded in 2013 by Dutch inventor Boyan Slat, 18 years old at the time. The venture is backed by Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff and PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel, among others, and funded mainly with private contributions, including a crowdfunding campaign. The scientists’ concept is simple but ingenious.

Read the rest at independent.org.

Lawrence McQuillan, George Tibbitts

Lawrence McQuillan, George Tibbitts

View all posts

Our Books

Shop books published by the Libertarian Institute.

libetarian institute longsleeve shirt

Support via Amazon Smile

Our Books

libertarian inst books

Recent Articles

Recent

The ‘Will of the People’ Post-Election Horror Show

The ‘Will of the People’ Post-Election Horror Show

On the morning after elections, many voters wake up and instinctively quote Dorothy Parker: “What fresh hell is this?” “Will of the people!” is the correct answer—at least if a Democrat won the election. Actually, the notion that election results represent the “will...

read more
Hands Off My Social Media!

Hands Off My Social Media!

Democrats have found a new superstar to help get out the progressive vote: Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair Lina Khan. Khan has done town halls with Representatives Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL) and Mark Pocan (D-WI), Senate candidate and current Representative Ruben...

read more
TGIF: Election Reflections

TGIF: Election Reflections

The history of the human race is one long story of attempts by certain persons and classes to obtain control of the power of the State, so as to win earthly gratifications at the expense of others. --William Graham Sumner, 1883 For advocates of individual liberty,...

read more

Pin It on Pinterest

Share This