For the first time in history, conservationists have collected trash from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch for recycling.
After one year of testing, The Ocean Cleanup organization announced this week that their System 001/B vessel is successfully capturing and collecting plastic *debris.
The patch is a massive island of trash drifting halfway between California and Hawaii. Over a trillion pieces of debris have collected there because of the swirling *vortex of current—a floating mass roughly twice the size of Texas.
After discovering the patch in the 90s, scientists said it would take thousands of years to clean it up—but Slat quickly *made a name for himself after he presented a TEDx talk in which he claimed that he could do it in less than ten, if he could get his special machinery built.
Though his claim caused many skeptics to *raise their eyebrows, Slat dropped out of college so he could *bring his plans to life. Apart from crowdfunding $2.2 million for his idea, he *garnered millions more dollars through interested investors.
“After beginning this journey seven years ago, this first year of testing in the *unforgivable environment of *the high seas strongly indicates that our vision is attainable and that the beginning of our mission to rid the ocean of plastic garbage, which has *accumulated for decades, is within our sights,” said Slat.Once fully operational, The Ocean Cleanup will return plastic to land for recycling. The timing of that phase of the mission depends on further testing and design *iteration.
保護主義者有史以來第一次從太平洋垃圾帶收集垃圾進行回收。
經過一年的測試，海洋清潔組織本周宣布，他們的船(船型System 001/B)已成功捕獲和收集塑料碎片。
太平洋垃圾帶是一個巨大的垃圾島，漂浮在加州和夏威夷之間。海洋帶來的漩渦導致該海域聚集了超過一萬億片的塑膠碎片-漂浮的物質大約是德克薩斯州的兩倍。
在90年代發現太平洋垃圾帶之後，科學家說清理它需要數千年的時間，但是史拉特(Boyan Slat)在發表TEDx演講時聲稱他若成功建造自己的專用機械，便能在十年內完成這項任務。他也因為此一説法而走紅。
儘管許多人對他的主張持懷疑態度，他仍輟學進而實現自己的計劃。除了募資220萬美元，他還獲得了對此計劃感興趣的投資者數百萬美元的資助。
斯拉特說：「七年前開始執行此計劃後，在環境惡劣的公海進行測試的第一年，便顯示了我們的願景是可以實現的，而我們清除海洋中積累數十年的塑料垃圾的使命也開始了。」
海洋清理器（The Ocean Cleanup）一旦完全投入使用，便能將塑料帶回陸地以進行回收。該階段任務的時間則取決於進一步的測試和設計的反覆改良。
