5 Gyres - Understanding Plastic Pollution Through Exploration, Education, and Action

My my, it's busy times here at 5 Gyres HQ.  Half the team has descended on Chile to embark on the first ever research expedition to the South Pacific and I'm packing bags to head for the marine debris (aka plastic pollution) conference in Hawaii.  So, the blog is pretty much going to be on fire for the next foreseeable future with reports from Anna and Marcus from the deep blue, and me on the ground in Hawaii.  

Pictured above is one of our posters we'll be presenting at the conference. These are Marcus's babies. He's done a lot of work on trawl design (the devices by which we sample oceanic plastic) pushing the envelope for global data collection.  It's our mission to create several trawl designs for different applications/scenarios. What's important to remember about how plastic as pollution manifests in the ocean is that the data is still very, very limited. Though oceanic plastic pollution has received a lot of press lately, we still don't know very much. We know it's out there, we know we find it everywhere we look, and we know how much plastic we consume.   

The scientific contributions to this issue are limited, too.  In total, there are probably only a couple dozen peer reviewed papers on the subject, and because data collection is very expensive, Marcus has made it his mission to get data from vessels of opportunity, creating trawls that citizen scientists and scientists alike can utilize to contribute to the picture. Beyond our own expeditions, our Travel Trawlprogram aims to put simple, compact trawls in the hands of sailors already going places that have never been explored.  As part of the program, sailors will be trained to execute an accepted protocol, giving us the best baseline picture of this problem yet.  Globally. Marcus's model will drastically reduce the cost of procuring good data.  And thus, beyond our own flagship expeditions, 5 Gyres will always have a presence at sea. To battle a global problem, we need global data.  

On this voyage we have a few firsts, too.  We'll have a full time presence on Treehugger which is exciting. A writer from Latin America is aboard and will be sending updates several times a week. We also have activist/actress Q'orianka Kilcher aboard as part of a larger PR/Outreach campaign. 

Stayed tuned! Lots happening, and as always, we can always use your help.