Ocean Clean Up Machine – Summary and Reader-response Draft 3

Ocean Clean Up Machine – Summary and Reader-response Draft 3 
(Edited on 16th February 2020)

In the article, “Boy Genius Boyan Slat’s Giant Ocean Clean-up Machine Is Real”, Schiller (2017) has reported how Boyan Slat’s improved “Ocean Clean-up” system that targets to collect half of trillions plastic waste in the “Pacific Garbage Patch” within the next half a decade.

Boyan Slat has stepped up to introduce his prototype design of an ocean clean-up machine. Unfortunately, Slat’s design of a floater system anchored to deep seabed has sustainability issues that have an impact to cost and time for the whole ocean clean-up operation. Slat discovered a technological solution that replaced the fixed seabed floater with a deep-water skirts system and ready to be deployed in 2018. Schiller has shared that Slat’s company, “The Ocean Clean-up Foundation”, has gained trust and confidence over the past six years. Slat now has a pool of motivated working teams carrying out detailed studies on plastic waste, the ocean movements and working on his machine design. Schiller was convinced by Slat's design that the drag generated by the skirts, propelled automatically by oceanic forces, would produce significant success in cleaning up to half of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in a shorter time with a reasonably low required cost. Slat aims to recycle the plastic waste collected and to receive sponsorships.

Schiller’s article focused too much on Slat’s ocean clean up machine and its operation. Schiller failed to discuss that there are 2 sides of the plastic pollution problems. On one side, there is the great pacific garbage patch, the floating plastic legacy issue that does not go away by itself. With Slat’s ideas, finally, the ocean clean-up operations are being initiated. And on the other side is plastic waste still entering the ocean. It could be the bulk of plastic waste that was just disposed by passing ships or probably even plastic waste that drifted miles from the mainland over a period.

If Schiller has put in the effort to conduct research on Slat’s background and his other plans, Schiller could have obtained more information to share that the main source of plastic pollution at the ocean are the rivers. According to the ocean clean-up website, Slat and his team have already discovered that “Rivers are the main source of ocean plastic pollution”. It is very alarming when their research found that “1000 rivers are responsible for roughly 80% of the pollution”. A YouTube video (TomoNews US, 2017) has shared worrying information that the large contributor to plastic waste comes from rivers in Asian countries. Much of the plastic pollution stemmed from an underdeveloped waste management system. Humans are responsible for the waste that is just dropped as litter into the rivers or disposed of overtime as landfills along riverbanks. These wastes were not well contained and ended up into rivers and flow out to the ocean when the seawater tide changes.

There are other interesting details that Schiller failed to cover in his 2017 article on Slat’s plans for the river plastic pollution. Surprisingly, Slat and his team have already planned in 2016, to stop plastic flowing out from the rivers which he called it “close the tap”. Slat has also invented a prototype river clean up-machine called "The Interceptor". He has even successfully engaged the Indonesian government to propose his 1st major river clean-up project.

Schiller could possibly strike readers' interest if he covers adequate information on the whole river to ocean plastic waste problem in his article. The article would be very useful to spread awareness that plastic waste problems are mainly caused by human negligence and behaviour. The whole world should be grateful to Slat and his team as they planned not to only remove plastics from the ocean but also to tackle them right from the river source before entering the ocean. Schiller could have given further credits to Slat and his ocean clean-up team who has been working beyond their goals in developing effective plans and new technologies for the fastest possible reduction in the amount of plastic waste.


References

Schiller, B (2017). Boy Genius Boyan Slat’s Giant Ocean Cleanup Machine Is Real.
https://www.fastcompany.com/40419899/boy-genius-boyan-slats-giant-ocean-cleanup-machine-is-real

TomoNews US (2017, September 30). Ocean Pollution: 60% of plastic waste in the oceans comes from just five Asian countries. [Video]. Youtube.
https://youtu.be/UynITtG7HLE

The Ocean Clean-up/Rivers (2016). The Ocean Clean-up. 
https://theoceancleanup.com/rivers/