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A Dutch Teenager Had a Dream to Clean Up the World's Oceans: 7 Years On, It's Coming True

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A Dutch Teenager Had a Dream to Clean Up the World's Oceans: 7 Years On, It's Coming True

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For someone who gets violently seasick, Boyan Slat spends a lot of time thinking about the ocean. The Dutch inventor has designed the world's first ocean plastic cleanup system but admits he won't be on the ship with it when it launches out of San Francisco on Saturday. "I am not a man of the sea," he says.

After five and a half years of hard work, the 23-year-old Slat will watch from dry land as System 001 - a floating barrier nearly 2,000ft long - snakes its way out under the Golden Gate Bridge into the Pacific. Its destination is the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a gyre of plastic waste twice the size of Texas held in position by ocean currents between California and Hawaii.

If all goes to plan, Slat says, an array of 60 systems could reduce the amount of plastic there by half by 2025. "I hope that this will be a turning point for the plastic pollution problem," Slat tells TIME in a phone interview a few days before the launch, in between final preparations. "For sixty years it has only gotten worse and worse. Now hopefully we're turning the tide."

The eradication of the garbage patch, and more broadly the salvation of our oceans, has been Slat's single-minded goal ever since he was 16 years old, when a diving trip to Greece yielded more plastic bag sightings than fish. Struck by the idea for a floating barrier that could collect plastic using the power of ocean currents alone, he founded his company, The Ocean Cleanup, aged just 18.

Boyan Slat, CEO of The Ocean Cleanup The Ocean Cleanup

The idea grabbed imaginations around the world. In 2015, an early prototype of System 001 was featured on TIME's list of the best inventions of 2015. The project has come a long way since then, Slat says. "It takes a trained eye to see the similarities."

What was originally envisaged as a large rigid barrier arranged around a central tank for collecting plastic, is today an unmanned, modular system that moves with the currents, naturally gravitating to areas of higher concentration. From the air it looks like a pipeline sitting on the surface of the sea, but beneath the waves lies a 10ft deep 'skirt,' which traps plastic accumulated by the current.

Because the system is solid rather than a net, Slat says sea life will be protected from becoming ensnared. The hope is that plastic will accumulate as if on a seashore, ready to be collected by boats and taken for recycling.

It's an ambitious plan, and one that has received millions of dollars of funding thanks to fast-shifting public opinion on plastic. In December 2017, 193 countries signed a U.N. resolution to eliminate ocean plastic pollution, and big corporations like McDonald's are moving to remove single-use plastics from their stores. (Some say not fast enough.) The U.N. says over 8 million tons of plastic still enter the oceans each year - the equivalent of a garbage truck full of plastic every minute.

But reducing our addiction to plastic is just one half of the equation, Slat says. "These garbage patches won't go away by themselves. Even if we were to close the tap today the plastic would still be there in 100 years."

System 001 floating in the San Francisco Bay before its launch The Ocean Cleanup

Slat sees his mission as a race against time. Plastic gradually breaks down into smaller and smaller pieces called microplastics which can eventually enter the food chain. Currently, however, just 8% of the plastic mass in the Pacific garbage patch is microplastics, according to research carried out by The Ocean Cleanup published in the journal Scientific Reports. "But of course what's going to happen over the next few decades is that all the other 92% of plastic will be turned into microplastics as well," Slat says. "So the sooner we get it out, the better."

A thorny question remains in what will happen to the plastic that is brought back to shore from The Ocean Cleanup's systems. Slat says he wants to turn it into branded merchandise, but acknowledges that all depends on the quality of the plastic, which remains a mystery. In any case, most of the plastic in the oceans is single-use, Slat argues. "By not making it into anything single-use, you can already reduce the chances of it ending up back in the oceans by 99%," he says.

But it's possible that lots of the waste returned to land will have to be carted off to third-party recycling plants and eventually recycled into more single-use plastics that might one day return to the oceans. The task ahead isn't so much Herculean as Sisyphean.

Nevertheless, Slat isn't dissuaded easily. "Big problems require big solutions," he says. "If anyone has any better ideas, we'd love to know."

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This Dutch Teen Dreamed of Cleaning Up the Ocean. Now, It's Happening

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For someone who gets violently seasick, Boyan Slat spends a lot of time thinking about the ocean.

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David Katz: The surprising solution to ocean plastic | TED Talk

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Can we solve the problem of ocean plastic pollution and end extreme poverty at the same time? That’s the ambitious goal of The Plastic Bank: a worldwide chain of stores where everything from school tuition to cooking fuel and more is available for purchase in exchange for plastic garbage -- which is then sorted, shredded and sold to brands who reuse “social plastic” in their products. Join David Katz to learn more about this step towards closing the loop in the circular economy. “Preventing ocean plastic could be humanity’s richest opportunity,” Katz says.

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Straw No More | Molly Steer | TEDxJCUCairns

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Here is the full transcript of nine-year old Straw No More project campaigner Molly Steer's TEDx Talk titled: Straw No More at TEDxJCUCairns conference. TRANSCRIPT:
Hi, my name is Molly Steer and I'm nine years old, and I've just found out that straws really do suck. Earlier this year, my mom and I went to see a movie called "A Plastic Ocean." It was the first time that I've been told that plastic never ever breaks down, but actually never goes away.

The movie said that all over the world oceans are filling up with our plastic rubbish. This plastic gets into our oceans and hurts the marine animals. But not only that, when humans eat fish and seafood, we are eating the plastic that they have eaten. Birds are eating broken up bits of plastic and then starving because there's no room left in their stomachs for real food.

Turtles think that plastic bags are jellyfish which is their favorite food. And we've all seen that plastic straws stacked up on poor turtles' nose. It's not fair. On my way home from watching the movie that night, I started thinking about what I could do to help. I started thinking about plastic straws. They seem kind of harmless, don't they?

But did you know, every day, humans use more than 500 million straws? If you wind these up, end to end, that would wrap around planet Earth four times. Every single day I thought about how we only use these plastic straws for a few minutes before we throw them in the bin.

And what about the drinks that come with more than one straw? It's crazy! The problem is: they don't always go in the bin. They often end up in the storm water drains and go to the ocean. And even if the straws do make it to the bin, what then? What do you think happens to them, once we throw them in the bin? As I said before, plastic can't break down, so can't actually ever go "away."

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Molly Steer: Straw No More at TEDxJCUCairns (Full Transcript)

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Here is the full transcript of nine-year old Straw No More project campaigner Molly Steer's TEDx Talk titled: Straw No More at TEDxJCUCairns conference. TRANSCRIPT: Hi, my name is Molly Steer and I'm nine years

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You Can't Just "Clean Up" the Plastic in the Ocean. Here's Why.

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You Can't Just "Clean Up" the Plastic in the Ocean. Here's Why.

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Plastic Planet is a series on the global plastics crisis that evaluates the environmental and human costs and considers possible solutions to this devastating man-made problem.

All products are independently selected by our editors. If you buy something, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Since the early 1950s, there has been an estimated 8.3 billion tons - and counting - of plastic produced on the planet, according to a 2017 study published in the Science Advances journal. The United Nations Environment Program reports that roughly 60% of that lump sum has made its way to landfills or the ocean. Each year, an estimated 8 million metric tons of plastic ends up in the ocean, according to the advocacy group Ocean Conservancy. Some calculations predict that there could be more plastic by weight in the ocean than fish by 2050.

The situation is so dire that the ocean is already home to five notable trash vortexes, more commonly known as garbage patches: the North Atlantic Gyre, the South Atlantic Gyre, the South Pacific Gyre, the Indian Ocean Gyre, and the North Pacific Gyre. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, located in the North Pacific Gyre between California and Hawaii, is the most notorious as it is the largest of the five, with an estimated 1.8 trillion pieces of trash. For measure, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is three times the size of France and weighs as much as 43,000 cars. And according to experts, it is growing "exponentially."

The fundamental issue with plastic is that it's largely not biodegradable. This means it cannot be broken down into reusable compounds. Instead, it degrades over time into smaller particles also known as microplastics, which are defined as pieces that are five millimeters in length or less, according to the National Ocean Service. While these tiny particles aren't floating at the top of the ocean, they pose a threat: Aside from contaminating the waters, plastic in the ocean injures and kills marine animals - collectively, it has impacted at least 800 species worldwide. Humans are impacted as well, as microplastics make their way into our food through seafood, water, and sea salt. Unfortunately, little is known about the scale of the problem since research is in its preliminary stages.

Some nations carry a larger burden of the blame than others. According to a 2015 study published in Science Advances, the top six countries for ocean garbage are China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, and Thailand. But other nations are not necessarily free from blame. The same study found that the United States, for example, contributes as much as 242 million pounds of plastic trash to the ocean every year.

Tackling the man-made environmental disaster - both cleaning up the existing plastic pollution in the ocean and preventing further damage - is not easy. "It is not as simple as going out there and just scooping up these floating islands of trash," Nick Mallos, the director of Ocean Conservancy's Trash Free Seas program, tells Teen Vogue.

Currently, a nearly 2,000-foot-long floater, essentially a floating trash collector, has made its way to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch to take a stab at tackling the existing problem - it's the brainchild of 24-year-old Boyan Slat, who conceived the idea for his contraption in 2013 and started the Ocean Cleanup. Slat's device, a high-density polyethylene pipe, travels with the wind, waves, and storms and sweeps up plastic along the way. It also includes a 10-foot-long impermeable underwater skirt that picks up plastic that isn't on the surface. The plastic will then be removed from the water and taken by boat to shore, where it will be processed for recycling.

The first step of the Netherlands-based organization is to collect the larger floating plastic objects before approaching the smaller pieces. Within five years, the Ocean Cleanup hopes to remove half of the plastic in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Now, weeks in, Business Insider has reported things don't appear to be going as they should be: The garbage collected by the device is drifting into sea instead of staying trapped. "Although we are not harvesting plastic yet, based on the current results, we are positive we are close to making it work," wrote Slat in an update in November, adding that his team believes "the first solution [they] will attempt could potentially remediate both of these causes."

A spokesperson for the Ocean Cleanup told Teen Vogue that Boyan and the rest of the team are "highly confident" that finding a solution is just "a matter of time," noting that all other aspects of the system - surviving rough weather and not harming marine life - are working well aside from not being able to keep the trapped plastic. "These kinds of issues are certainly something that they anticipated," said the spokesperson. "Expecting the unexpected is inherent to the process when you move from modeling and testing to reality. It also stresses the importance of going out there because reality is the ultimate test for the beta system."

Elsewhere, U.K.-based the Plastic Tide, founded by Peter Kohler, uses drone-mounted cameras, machine learning, and citizen science to take aerial photos and train a "machine-learning" algorithm to recognize plastic trash. The idea would be to track the existing plastic and the spread of plastic to home in on where to prioritize cleanup efforts.

Another element is reducing the amount of plastic that gets into the ocean going forward: In 2015, Reuters reported that research was released based on data from 2010, showing that more than 8 million tons of plastic go from land to the ocean each year.

Emma Tonge, a communications and outreach specialist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Marine Debris Program, tells Teen Vogue that "prevention is the key to solving the marine debris problem over time." She uses the analogy of an overflowing sink: You can't fix the buildup without turning off the faucet. For marine debris, cleaning up nearshore and coastline regions is akin to turning off the faucets.

"Shorelines and coastal areas are easy to access, and we try to get these debris items before they have the chance to get to the ocean," says Tonge, whose program's main focus is prevention.

Ocean Conservancy's Trash Free Seas program organizes an international coastal cleanup that it says is the world's largest volunteer effort and works with businesses and individuals to implement change in practices and behaviors that impact ocean health. The Ocean Conservancy also has a mobile app - called Clean Swell - that allows individuals to record each item of trash they collect, which is later used by scientists and policymakers. While cleanups won't solve the marine plastic debris problem, it makes a difference. Mallos says it is a "Band-Aid, not a cure," but says cleanups have an "immediate and direct impact."

Encouraging corporations to use less plastic is one way to reduce the odds of plastic debris: Putting less plastic on shelves means less is purchased, consumed, and discarded.

"Corporations that either make plastic - the actual material - or make products that use plastic in their packaging have a very big responsibility in this problem," Mallos says. "There are some products out there, like plastic bags and expanded polystyrene food and beverage packaging - these are materials and types of products that simply no longer have a place in our economy. They pose a very severe risk to the marine environment when they leak into the ocean. And we know that there are suitable alternatives for these products that deliver the same utility and functionality as these products."

A 2018 brand audit conducted by environmental activist group Break Free From Plastic of more than 187,000 pieces of plastic trash across 239 cleanups spanning 42 countries shed light onto potential offenders. Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, and Nestlé were the most frequent multinational brands collected in cleanups. A PepsiCo spokesperson told Teen Vogue the company is "committed to achieving 100% recyclable, compostable, or biodegradable packaging by 2025" and strives to "use 25% recycled plastic content in [their] plastic packaging by that same year." Coca-Cola told Teen Vogue it has placed "ambitious goals" for the company's World Without Waste vision: It aims to "collect and recycle a bottle or can for every one [they] sell - regardless of where it comes from - by 2030" and "use an average of 50% recycled content in our bottles and cans by 2030." Teen Vogue has reached out to Nestlé and will update once we hear back.

Some significant progress is also being made by other companies. The Ellen MacArthur Foundation, a U.K.-based environmental charity, launched a campaign to get corporations on board with accountability. So far, more than 250 organizations - including Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Unilever, H&M, S.C. Johnson, and L'Oréal - have pledged to eradicate plastic waste within seven years. These organizations have pledged to reuse, recycle, or compost 100% of their plastic packaging by 2025.

Mallos also spotlights two other areas that need work. One is creating appropriate waste collecting and recycling infrastructure for existing plastic goods in the market to guarantee responsible disposal. The other is to look at innovative materials that can replace some of the most problematic forms of plastic that currently exist. "Corporations have a very important role in supporting and catalyzing investment and innovation in many of those fronts," Mallos says.

And then there is consumer accountability. A recent wave of consumer activism has led to the widespread ban of straws, which are especially problematic since they cannot be recycled. A noble endeavor, no doubt, but according to a Bloomberg Opinion essay, straws only account for 0.03% of total plastic waste. To truly fight ocean plastic pollution, a broader approach is needed.

Mallos says individuals can help in three ways. One is to reevaluate our daily plastic waste footprint and make decisions to reuse things like plastic bags and water bottles. Second is to send a message with your purchasing power: Watch what you buy so corporations take into account consumer preference and purchasing habits. Lastly, advocate for smart policy - like plastic bag bans - that "deliver locally appropriate solutions."

The Ocean Conservancy's 2018 Coastal Cleanup Report gathered data from beach cleanups across the globe to identify common trash items: cigarette butts, food wrappers, plastic beverage bottles, plastic bottle caps, plastic grocery bags, other plastic bags, straws and stirrers, plastic takeout containers, plastic lids, and foam takeout containers. "For the first time ever, all of the top 10 items found globally were made of plastic," Mallos says. "We know that globally, plastic production is increasing. What we're seeing now on the beaches is a manifestation of that production.

"This is a global, complex issue. And everyone has a role to play. That ranges from us as individuals all the way up to governments and corporations," Mallos says.

"No matter who you are, you're connected to the ocean. No matter where you live, you're connected to the ocean," Tonge says. "Everyone can really have a part to play, no matter how small or large that part is."
For more information on the global plastics crisis, read the rest of the Plastic Planet series.

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You Can't Just "Clean Up" the Plastic in the Ocean. Here's Why.

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In this Plastic Planet reported feature, we explain why ocean cleanup isn't the best approach to combat the global plastics crisis.

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New tools aim to better predict blooms of toxic algae

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New tools aim to better predict blooms of toxic algae

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algae Single-celled organisms, once considered plants (they aren't). As aquatic organisms, they grow in water. Like green plants, they depend on sunlight to make their food.

app Short for application, or a computer program designed for a specific task.

asthma A disease affecting the body's airways, which are the tubes through which animals breathe. Asthma obstructs these airways through swelling, the production of too much mucus or a tightening of the tubes. As a result, the body can expand to breathe in air, but loses the ability to exhale appropriately. The most common cause of asthma is an allergy. Asthma is a leading cause of hospitalization and the top chronic disease responsible for kids missing school.

bacteria (singular: bacterium) Single-celled organisms. These dwell nearly everywhere on Earth, from the bottom of the sea to inside other living organisms (such as plants and animals).

biology The study of living things. The scientists who study them are known as biologists.

bloom (in microbiology) The rapid and largely uncontrolled growth of a species, such as algae in waterways enriched with nutrients.

carbon dioxide (or CO ₂) A colorless, odorless gas produced by all animals when the oxygen they inhale reacts with the carbon-rich foods that they've eaten. Carbon dioxide also is released when organic matter burns (including fossil fuels like oil or gas). Carbon dioxide acts as a greenhouse gas, trapping heat in Earth's atmosphere. Plants convert carbon dioxide into oxygen during photosynthesis, the process they use to make their own food.

cell The smallest structural and functional unit of an organism. Typically too small to see with the unaided eye, it consists of a watery fluid surrounded by a membrane or wall. Depending on their size, animals are made of anywhere from thousands to trillions of cells. Most organisms, such as yeasts, molds, bacteria and some algae, are composed of only one cell.

chlorophyll Any of several green pigments found in plants that perform photosynthesis - creating sugars (foods) from carbon dioxide and water.

colleague Someone who works with another; a co-worker or team member.

computer model A program that runs on a computer that creates a model, or simulation, of a real-world feature, phenomenon or event.

computer program A set of instructions that a computer uses to perform some analysis or computation. The writing of these instructions is known as computer programming.

cyanobacteria A type of bacteria that can convert carbon dioxide into other molecules, including oxygen.

cyst A group of cells that form a type of bubble-like shell or sac. Some cysts develop as a result of disease or tissue damage. Others may develop as a normal, protective during certain phases of a parasite's maturation.

diarrhea (adj. diarrheal) Loose, watery stool (feces) that can be a symptom of many types of microbial infections affecting the gut.

dolphins A highly intelligent group of marine mammals that belong to the toothed-whale family. Members of this group include orcas (killer whales), pilot whales and bottlenose dolphins.

domoic acid A toxin produced by some algae. If ingested by humans or other animals, it can cause brain damage, seizures and memory problems.

endangered An adjective used to describe species at risk of going extinct.

environment The sum of all of the things that exist around some organism or the process and the condition those things create. Environment may refer to the weather and ecosystem in which some animal lives, or, perhaps, the temperature and humidity (or even the placement of components in some electronics system or product).

Environmental Protection Agency (or EPA) A national government agency charged with helping create a cleaner, safer and healthier environment in the United States. Created on Dec. 2, 1970, it reviews data on the possible toxicity of new chemicals (other than foods or drugs, which are regulated by other agencies) before they are approved for sale and use. Where such chemicals may be toxic, it sets limits or guidelines on how much of them may be released into (or allowed to build up in) the air, water or soil.

flagella (sing. flagellum) A thread-like structure that comes out of certain types of cells. The term derives from the Latin word for whip. And that's because the structures serve like oars to help these cells travel.

freshwater A noun or adjective that describes bodies of water with very low concentrations of salt. It's the type of water used for drinking and making up most inland lakes, ponds, rivers and streams, as well as groundwater.

global warming The gradual increase in the overall temperature of Earth's atmosphere due to the greenhouse effect. This effect is caused by increased levels of carbon dioxide, chlorofluorocarbons and other gases in the air, many of them released by human activity.

kelp A type of large seaweed that is usually a type of brown algae. They grow underwater and form large forests, providing habitat for many organisms. Some kelp forests are so large they can be seen from space.

marine mammal Any of many types of mammals that spend most of its life in the ocean environment. These include whales and dolphins, walruses and sea lions, seals and sea otters, manatees and dugongs - even polar bears.

microcystins A class of toxins produced by some freshwater algae that are also known as cyanobacteria. Most of these toxins work by poisoning the liver.

microscope An instrument used to view objects, like bacteria, or the single cells of plants or animals, that are too small to be visible to the unaided eye.

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (or NOAA) A science agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce. Initially established in 1807 under another name (The Survey of the Coast), this agency focuses on understanding and preserving ocean resources, including fisheries, protecting marine mammals (from seals to whales), studying the seafloor and probing the upper atmosphere.

nutrient A vitamin, mineral, fat, carbohydrate or protein that a plant, animal or other organism requires as part of its food in order to survive.

oceanography (adj. oceanographic ) The branch of science that deals with the physical and biological properties and phenomena of the oceans. People who work in this field are known as oceanographers.

organism Any living thing, from elephants and plants to bacteria and other types of single-celled life.

paralysis (adj. paralytic) The inability to willfully move muscles in one or more parts of the body. In some cases, nerves that carry the signal to move may have been severed or damaged. In other cases, the brain may be the source of the problem: It may fail to understand or act on a nerve's signal to move.

phosphorus A highly reactive, nonmetallic element occurring naturally in phosphates. Its scientific symbol is P. It is an important part of many chemicals and structures that are found in cells, such as membranes, and DNA.

risk The chance or mathematical likelihood that some bad thing might happen. For instance, exposure to radiation poses a risk of cancer. Or the hazard - or peril - itself. (For instance: Among cancer risks that the people faced were radiation and drinking water tainted with arsenic.)

satellite A moon orbiting a planet or a vehicle or other manufactured object that orbits some celestial body in space.

sea An ocean (or region that is part of an ocean). Unlike lakes and streams, seawater - or ocean water - is salty.

seawater The salty water found in oceans.

secrete (noun: secretion) The natural release of some liquid substance - such as hormones, an oil or saliva - often by an organ of the body.

short-term memory (also known as primary memory) The small amount of memory held actively in the mind for a short period of time, such as the series of digits in a telephone number.

species A group of similar organisms capable of producing offspring that can survive and reproduce.

toxic Poisonous or able to harm or kill cells, tissues or whole organisms. The measure of risk posed by such a poison is its toxicity.

toxin A poison produced by living organisms, such as germs, bees, spiders, poison ivy and snakes.

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New tools aim to better predict blooms of toxic algae

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Scientists across the United States are developing programs that can predict when blooms of toxic algal may occur.

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Unsightly plastic bottles, bags and other trash give just a hint of the largely unseen problem of plastic pollution. Scientists have found tiny bits of it throughout the ocean. The bad news: Sea life can’t tell the difference between plastic and food.

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Artist Dianna Cohen shares some tough truths about plastic pollution in the ocean and in our lives -- and some thoughts on how to free ourselves from the plastic gyre.

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Kids versus Fossil Fuels: A Chat with a Teenage Activist

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Kids versus Fossil Fuels: A Chat with a Teenage Activist

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Kids versus Fossil Fuels: A Chat with a Teenage Activist

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Scientific American spoke with Kelsey Juliana, one of the 21 kids who are suing the U.S. government over climate change

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Plastic Oceans
There are increasing high levels of man-made pollution in many of the world's seas and little actually disappears. By 2050 there will be more plastic than fish in the world's oceans.
We live on a blue planet; the world's oceans cover three quarters of the Earth. They contain 97% of the Earth's water and are currently absorbing around a third of the CO2 being produced by our activities and so helping in part by acting a buffer for some of the impacts of climate change. (30 to 40% of the carbon dioxide from human activity released into the atmosphere dissolves into oceans, resulting in the creation of carbonic acid.) Ocean acidification is therefore a rising concern. The average pH balance is dropping and as a result the growth of calcifying organisms such as corals and shellfish is being reduced. Acidification alone, though, is not the only pollution problem faced by the world's seas, and others are escalating at an even faster rate. The impacts and implications are huge and growing.

Around 80% of marine pollution comes from land-based activities. Waste runs or is dumped into drains and rivers and hence the seas. Oil, fertilisers, sewage, plastics and toxic chemicals are all part of the mix. Oil spills are less frequent but in many countries without an established recycling system, used oil is thrown down the drain or poured directly into rivers. Nutrients in fertiliser runoff from farms and lawns produce algae, depleting dissolved oxygen and suffocating marine life, causing dead zones in places such as the Gulf of Mexico and the Baltic. In many regions, untreated sewage still flows into the seas - 80% of urban sewage discharged into the Mediterranean is untreated. A recent addition to the challenge is the role of desalination plants, cropping up in areas of water stress from the Middle East to Australia and California. As a core by-product of their water purification process, they add salt into the seas, so increasing salinity and hence acute toxicity.

While all of the pollutants are having severe negative impact, perhaps the most visible - hence one that will drive the biggest change in the next decade - is plastic. Around 275 million tons of plastic waste is generated each year around the world; between 4.8 million and 12.7 million tons is either washed or dumped deliberately into the sea. The World Bank expects the planet's municipal solid waste to double within 15 years, much of this in the form of single-use plastic items. Bottles, bags, balloons, packaging, shoes - all take decades to break down. This waste is ingested by pretty much every marine animal including fish, dolphins, seals and turtles. So far, plastic has been found to be blocking the digestive tracts of at least 267 different species.

Although this is a global problem, the epicentre of plastic pollution is clear. Today 60% of the plastic waste in the ocean comes from just 5 countries - China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam. The media already talks about the Great Pacific Garbage patch. By 2025, plastic consumption in Asia will increase by 80%, surpassing 200 million tons; some are calling for specific interventions in these 5 countries. Regionally, the EU is aiming to halve plastic bag use by 2018 but this is not an international standard. Industry experts expect that by 2050 we will be producing three times as much plastic as we do today; on a volume basis, the WEF sees that by 2050 there will be more plastic than fish in the world's oceans.

Plastic pollution is however not alone as an increasing danger to the world's seas. One politically sensitive issue now is associated with dredging and land reclamation. Whether in the South China seas, where China is creating islands built on coral reefs, or in Indonesia, where sand mining has been providing Singapore with the resource to add 130 square kilometres of artificial 'reclaimed' land in the past 40 years, mining has evidently moved from land to sea.

With all the consequences of our actions now becoming apparent, the question is what will change going forward? Has ocean pollution become such a significant issue that there will be tangible change within the next decade? Some think so. Foremost, and largely because of plastic waste, the visibility of the impact is clear in the media and policy bodies. The UN has included as its 14 th Sustainable Development Goal the ambition to "conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources." A core 2025 objective is to prevent and significantly reduce marine pollution of all kinds, especially land-based activities, including marine debris and nutrient pollution.

Unfortunately, much of the world's oceans are not part of any one country's territorial waters. More than 40 per cent of the planet's surface (80 million square miles - seven times the area of the whole African continent) is ocean that belongs to everyone and no one - and hence is largely unregulated. While fishing, environmental, tourist and defence policies all unite to seek to protect and manage the sea close to a nation's shoreline, beyond a notional 12 to 200-mile limits it is largely a free-for-all. This is where the fish, dolphins and plankton are taking the hit. No one is setting the global rules and few are agreeing on a better way.

When will the balance tip? When will the negative impacts on our environment, the ecology and, most significantly from a financial perspective, a good share of our food resources start to change attitudes? Some are putting their faith in China to set new standards, but these may only apply locally. At a global level some see that a rethinking of the value of the 'blue-economy' is required. The Global Ocean Commission, for one, has called for adoption of an ambitious, long-term goal of zero plastic waste into the marine environment. This will require partnerships and behaviour changes that simply do not exist today, and the end of Europe and the US shipping its waste to Asia. If we start to see waste as a resource in the next decade, will perceptions - and maybe behaviours - shift?

Whether seeking to protect food supplies or looking to fulfil UN development goals, bringing order to the high seas is seen as critical for the future. We have already overshot the planetary limits on biodiversity and nitrogen; as the consequences become more apparent, can we avoid the same for ocean pollution?

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There are increasing high levels of man-made pollution in many of the world's seas and little actually disappears. By 2050 there will be more plastic than fish in the world's oceans. We live on a blue planet; the world's oceans cover three quarters of the Earth.

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No roads lead to Kuujjuaq. You can only get to this village, high in the Canadian Arctic, by boat or plane. The trees here are stunted and small, but the bears grow big. The 500 kids who live in Kuujjuaq (pronounced KOO-joo-ak) have unusual chores: they help their parents catch fish and hunt caribou to eat. This place might seem far away from the big problems of big cities, like water pollution and air pollution. But even here, people can't escape those problems. Pretty little Kuujjuaq, with its blue skies and crystal clear waters, also has an invisible pollution problem that rivals any city.

Toxic chemicals have a surprising way of finding their way up here to the Arctic. They are gushed out of factories and cities thousands of miles away, and they travel to the Arctic like birds flying north for the summer. The birds go back home, but the chemicals stay.

Everyone in Kuujjuaq has the chemicals in their bodies. No one knows their full effects, but they may hurt children in a slow and silent way. They could cause babies to get sick a little more often. And they might even cause kids to do worse in school.

No one would have dreamed that people in such a clean and beautiful place could be hurt by pollution from thousands of miles away. Then, in 1989, some scientists made a discovery.
POPs around the world
Eric Dewailly, a doctor at Laval University in Québec, Canada, was studying chemicals called persistent organic pollutants, or POPs. These are chemicals that can hang around for a long time in people's bodies or in the environment.

Dewailly and his team tested people in the cities of southern Québec (near the border with the United States) to see how much of these chemicals were in their bodies. Dewailly's team wanted to compare this group with people in the Arctic. They reasoned that people in the Arctic lived far from pollution, and so would probably have lower levels of POPs in their bodies.

So the scientists went up to Nunavik, the remote, northern part of Québec which includes Kuujjuaq and 13 other native Inuit villages. When they tested people in Nunavik they were surprised. People there had five to ten times as much of these chemicals in their bodies as people living in polluted cities. Some of the chemicals came from as far away as Russia!

Scientists now understand why this happens. The POPs include hundreds of different chemicals. Some are used in electronic gadgets like TVs, or in the lights and electrical wiring of buildings. Some are used in paints or for making windows waterproof. Others are sprayed onto crops as pesticides. But POPs have one thing in common: They like to evaporate. Just as a puddle of water dries on a hot summer sidewalk, POPs turn slowly into vapor and drift into the air. Winds can carry them thousands of miles.

POPs travel in the air until they reach a cold place. Have you noticed that on a hot day, a glass of lemonade with ice cubes in it collects little drops of water on the outside? This is because water vapor, which is a gas in the air, "condenses" onto the cold glass and forms those droplets-the opposite of evaporating or drying. The same thing happens with POPs, says Knut Breivik, an environmental chemist at the Norwegian Institute of Air Research in the city of Kjeller.

"Things tend to evaporate in warmer regions and condense when it gets colder," says Breivik. So when winds carry POPs into the Arctic or Antarctic parts of the world, cold temperatures cause them to condense onto plants or rocks or snow or oceans. And then they stay where they landed and build up over time.
10 million tons
Over the years, more than 10 million tons of POPs have probably floated through the skies to the Arctic. If those chemicals were piled on an area the size of a football field, the pile would rise 700 meters in the air-higher than the tallest building on Earth.

Since the chemicals are spread over the entire Arctic instead of a football field, there's actually only a small amount in any one place. A swimming pool filled with Arctic Ocean water might contain only a single tiny raindrop of POPs. But these chemicals have a nasty habit of collecting inside animals and people, so even a little bit in the environment can end up causing problems.

POPs tend to stick to the oils and fats in living things, so tiny ocean animals like plankton soak them up, just like a shirt soaks up a drop of spaghetti sauce. Those plankton are eaten by larger animals, which in turn are eaten by even larger animals.

Every time one animal eats another, more POPs enter the larger animal's body. Animals can't digest POPs. They take them in the front, but never poop or pee them out the back end. So the POPs collect and collect. The biggest animals, like sea birds, seals, and whales, have the most POPs in their bodies. And these animals are eaten by native Inuit people, who have lived and hunted in Nunavik and other parts of the Arctic for thousands of years.
Two teaspoons
By the time a boy growing up in Kuujjuaq turns five years old, he may have collected one or two little rain drops' worth of POP chemicals in his body. That doesn't sound like much-but it's thousands of times more concentrated than these chemicals are in sea water. In fact, that little boy has as much of these chemicals in his 20-kilogram body as there would be in two and a half million kilograms of sea water-in other words, enough sea water to fill an Olympic swimming pool! Scientists are trying to understand how the chemicals affect kids.

Kids in Kuujjuaq play and joke around.

André Perron/Wikimedia Commons

Dewailly's team has made many trips back to Nunavik to study the problem of POPs. In 1992 and 2004, they sailed in a ship to all 14 villages along the coast of Nunavik, including Kuujjuaq. The ship stopped at each village, and doctors took blood samples and examined people. They measured POPs in hundreds of newborn babies. Blood samples were taken again when the babies turned one year old. And these babies were studied for years as they grew, to find out how the POPs in their bodies affected them over time.

These studies have shown that POP chemicals affect the health of children in small but worrying ways. For one thing, these chemicals can weaken children's immune systems, says Pierre Ayotte, a toxicologist who works with Dewailly at Laval University. "Then you're less able to fight disease," he says. Babies with the most POPs in their bodies had more ear infections and more infections in their lungs-not minor infections like colds or flu, but serious ones that affect breathing and can sometimes send you to the hospital.
Long division
These chemicals might even affect how well kids do in school. When the babies were 1 year old, the Laval University scientists gave them some tests. They tested how well the babies used their hands. They also tested how well the babies paid attention and learned when they were shown new toys. All of these tests were videotaped, and scientists carefully studied the videos afterward. What they saw surprised them.

Babies with high POPs levels weren't quite as coordinated with their hands as other babies. They also didn't pay attention quite as well when they were being shown new toys-they often stared away at other things. And during several hours of tests, these babies became upset and cried more often.

These were small differences. You wouldn't notice them unless you watched the babies closely. But when the same babies were tested again at the age of 5, the ones with high POPs still did a little worse.

"At later ages you're still at a disadvantage," says Gina Muckle, a psychologist on the Laval University team that traveled to Nunavik to test the children. Muckle thinks that even small changes can affect how children do in school as they get older. They could affect how a child responds when taught something hard, like long division-whether they meet the challenge with a positive attitude, or get upset and discouraged. Or they could affect how a child responds to the stress of going to a new school-how well they make new friends, and whether they still do well in class during those awkward times. Little differences, over the years, could add up. "Those effects," says Muckle, "are likely to be a real disadvantage overall during the life of the person."
Still trickling
No one was happy to learn that POP chemicals were hurting people in the Arctic. But finding out about the problem gave the Inuit a chance to do something about it. In the 1990s, the United Nations held a meeting, called the Stockholm Convention, to discuss banning many POP chemicals. The Inuit sent people to the United Nations to tell how POPs had affected them. Since 1998, 140 countries have agreed to stop making many POP chemicals. As a result, levels of POPs in the Arctic are falling.

But it will take a long time for the problem to go away. For one thing, buildings around the world still contain many tons of POPs in their paint and wiring. Every day, a little bit of those chemicals turns into vapor and drifts outside. Eventually, it reaches the Arctic.

Researcher Sébastien Roy tests the quality of a lake's water during the 2004 Nunavik Health Survey.

Isabelle Dubois/NRBHSS

Soil also contains huge amounts of POP chemicals-and the hot blast of a forest fire can send them into the air, just as a hot blow drier causes water to evaporate from your hair. Breivik found that major fires in 2004 and 2006 caused large amounts of POPs to go into the air and reach the Arctic. Many of these chemicals last for 100 years or longer.
Likely suspects
The other problem is that while hundreds of POP chemicals are known, there are probably others that scientists still don't know about. "There are new compounds that are ending up in remote areas," says Frank Wania, an environmental chemist at the University of Toronto in Scarborough.

Many POPs contain the element chlorine. But in the last few years, scientists like Wania have been surprised to find that two families of manmade chemicals, which contain the elements fluorine or bromine, have found their way into the Arctic. "We failed to recognize [them] until they were already accumulating in the Arctic," says Wania-meaning that large amounts of them were turning up in seals, birds and people. By the time the chemicals were discovered and banned, the damage was done.

Scientists want to get ahead of the problem. Wania has surveyed 100,000 industrial chemicals. He was looking for chemicals-you could call them "hoppers," "fliers" and "swimmers"-which might reach the Arctic. Out of those chemicals, he found 120 likely suspects that he plans to look at more closely.

All of this might seem like a lot of effort. But many scientists think it's the right thing to do. It comes down to one question, says Muckle-whether we want children to be able to grow and learn to their full potential. "The environmental contaminants are certainly an issue," she says. "As a society we need to take that into account."

Douglas Fox is a freelance journalist who writes about life, earth and Antarctic sciences.

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No roads lead to Kuujjuaq. You can only get to this village, high in the Canadian Arctic, by boat or plane. The trees here are stunted and small, but the

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Join us in creating a just, equitable world free of plastic pollution & its toxic impacts.

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Xiuhtezcatl Tonatiuh, The 15-Year-Old Suing the Government over Climate Change from VICE 

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Xiuhtezcatl Tonatiuh, The 15-Year-Old Suing the Government over Climate Change from VICE 

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The Teenager Suing the US Government over Climate Change

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Mass Forest Restoration Could Greatly Slow Global Warming

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Mass Forest Restoration Could Greatly Slow Global Warming

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We have heard for years that planting trees can help save the world from global warming. That mantra was mostly a statement of faith, however. Now the data finally exist to show that if the right species of trees are planted in the right soil types across the planet, the emerging forests could capture 205 gigatons of carbon dioxide in the next 40 to 100 years. That's two thirds of all the CO ₂humans have generated since the industrial revolution. "Forest restoration is by far our most powerful planetary solution today," says Tom Crowther, a professor of global ecosystem ecology at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, and an author of a study published Thursday in Science that generated the eye-opening number.

The study team analyzed almost 80,000 satellite photo measurements of tree cover worldwide and combined them with enormous global databases about soil and climate conditions, evaluating one hectare at a time. The exercise generated a detailed map of how many trees the earth could naturally support-where forests grow now and where they could grow, outside of areas such as deserts and savannahs that support very few or no trees. The team then subtracted existing forests and also urban areas and land used for agriculture. That left 0.9 billion hectares that could be forested but have not been. If those spaces were filled with trees that already flourish nearby, the new growth could store 205 gigatons of carbon by the time the forests mature.

After 40 to 100 years, of course, the storage rate would flatten as forest growth levels off-but the researchers say the 205 gigatons would be maintained as old trees die and new ones grow. There would be "a bank of excess carbon that is no longer in the atmosphere," Crowther says.

The team has also created a planning tool linked to the map that will be open to the public starting July 5. Individuals and organizations can zoom in to any location to see where new forests could be started.

Crowther has not studied other carbon sequestration techniques that have been discussed a lot lately, such as ocean fertilization (growing algae to soak up carbon) or direct air capture (machines that pull CO ₂ from the atmosphere), but he thinks they would be much more expensive than growing trees. He estimates it might cost the world $300 billion to plant the 0.9 billion hectares. And new forests provide another strong benefit: they restore biodiversity, which is crucial because so many plant and animal species are disappearing. Crowther says he began to study reforestation because he was really looking for ways to stop species loss. Tremendous benefits beyond carbon sequestration "come from biodiversity-providing food, medicines, clean water and all sorts of things for humans," he says.

Pulling all that carbon from the atmosphere could take longer than anticipated, however. Forests might need more like 70 to 100 years to reach full maturity, says Robin Chazdon, an ecologist and evolutionary biologist at the University of Connecticut, who was not involved in the study. Yet she says any replanting should begin as soon as possible because climate change is likely to compromise forests' ability to grow. Higher temperatures increase tree respiration, which causes them stress. And drought will widen, reducing tree growth. Crowther adds that although climate change will allow more trees to grow in northern latitudes, it will also dry out tropical latitudes. Tree loss in the tropics, he says, will outpace gains in the high north.

Chazdon cautions that replanting may not be as simple as it sounds, and she wonders if 0.9 billion new hectares will ever be possible, given competing priorities. More trees consume more water, and this could threaten agriculture or other human activities in dry areas. And local people may not want forests if they need to generate income from the land, say from farming or herding. Some prominent reforestation programs, such as ones in the Philippines, have failed "because there was no local involvement," she says.

The best places to start reforestation are where multiple benefits can readily be gained. In a July 3 Science Advances paper, Chazdon and colleagues identify a series of locations in the tropics that have higher-than-average potential for benefits as well as ease of getting started.

All the new tree work, Chazdon says, signals that "we're entering into the practicality stage" of smart reforestation. "We can bring a lot of interdisciplinary science to bear. I hope there will be more interaction between scientists and politicians, realizing that the tools we now have can guide reforestation that is the most cost-effective, and has multiple benefits and fewer tradeoffs."

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Massive Forest Restoration Could Greatly Slow Global Warming

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We have heard for years that planting trees can help save the world from global warming. That mantra was mostly a statement of faith, however. Now the data finally exist to show that if the right species of trees are planted in the right soil types across the planet, the emerging forests could capture 205 gigatons of carbon dioxide in the next 40 to 100 years.