Teenager’s Invention Could Clean Ocean Garbage Within 5 Years

Updated: September 12, 2013

Every single day that passes shows our oceans getting more and more polluted with garbage, plastic, and filth, and now on top of that the Japanese have now radiated the ocean to such an extent that no one knows for sure how bad it really is.

With all that happening, you would think that world leaders would get involved and help with the problem, but in their greed all they look for are the profits of today with a screw the future attitude that sends waves of action over words ripples around the globe. No world leader or company has yet to step up to the plate to tackle this immense problem, that if it keeps growing will affect life on this planet with devastating results that will make all the money in the world useless.

With no planet to sustain life what does petty corporation finance mean in the long run, I will tell you now, absolute zero. The thing is someone is trying to tackle this problem and he is yet to be a man as this dude is 19 years old and not even old enough to drink or vote in our country. Meet this Dutch teenager, 19 Year old Boyan Slat, who is spearheading an initiative which aims to clean the world’s oceans in an efficient way. His concept involves using booms and processing facilities to collect plastic while allowing fish and plankton to pass freely. If his process works it should clean the oceans in a mere 5 year time span allowing life to flourish and the seas to repair themselves after humans have polluted it over the last 200 or so years.

The prospective project could potentially collect as much as 16 billion lbs of plastic from each ocean gyre over a period of 5 years. The plastic could then be sold and re-used according to the project’s website. Many others also agree that this would be a great thing, but then why isn’t anything happening on the quick pace? Money; as in what money can a company make cleaning the ocean when no one wants to foot the bill. My solution is this: Every country makes a donation within its affordable parameters that goes toward cleaning the oceans of the world. Being selfish and looking for profit is all well and good in a business model, but what happens when there is nothing left to buy or sell because we are dying from a planet that was once a beautiful paradise that is turning into a virtual garbage pit. If we all stood together for even a moment we could radically make changes to better our planet and ourselves. Thanks for reading Tech Of Tomorrow, and how do you feel about this, a great idea or too much too late?

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MrXleader

I think they hope to make money after the project on Mars starts and if it proves profitable they will probably look for money there,and if we weren’t so self centred there wouldnt evne be food hunger or poverty in my opinion.
Based

so clean the ocean, protect the environment, stop ruining ships AND clean our food all while being profitable? Sign me up!
TheMetalSgt

For some reason, I have no faith in the human race that governments will invest in this. Better spend trillions on war, right USA? There are so many technologies we could have already used to make the planet a better place. I think it’ll take a massive slap in the face from mother nature to change the way we do things. Either that, or the rich gtfo and the poor get to stay on the dirty planet, like Elysium. lol. But this is a sweet idea. Sorry for sounding depressing, but I’ve heard too many awesome ideas that never get invested in because there is not enough profit.
Deaded22

If I had the money that my boss spent on junk she mostly throws away I would gladly put money towards cleaning the ocean.
TheMetalSgt

I do hope countries invest in this though. Even at my short life I’ve seen the planet get significantly more polluted. I can’t imagine what it will look like when I’m old if we continue like this. Kudos to this teen and hopefully we can see this SOON.
Piet

A student from Delft (NL). That’s where I study too
LapX

Holy shit his little mouth noise is annoying, seems promising but I can’t watch that video…
Kyle Coops Cooper

Fantastic, now to overthrow all the governments so that the human race can work on this.
Ryan Airth

Perhaps countries that cause the most pollution, should pay more than those that don’t, further promoting a clean environment, in order to save money ^^
If I were rich, I would invest, but I’m not, so I can’t
Sandy Bruce

Its never too late as long as we are all alive. There is a possible solution. I think this is a great idea and every country should pitch in. The very poor countries get a pass on the first 5 years. The world powers and emerging economies have enough money to get this done without breaking a sweat. We waste more on things that are a lot less important. Matter of fact. We collect $1 from every person in the Large countries and emerging markets. That would be enough to sustain this project for years to come. Thanks for sharing!
daniel

is it weird that humans are the only organisms that pay to live on earth ??
Da Wookie

I like the cocept but struggle to give them credence when they make claims like “.. allowing life to flourish and the seas to repair themselves after humans have polluted it over the last 200 or so years.” So humans had plastics some two hundred years ago or did they not pollute before then? Stick to the facts, don’t make left wing kook statements, and let a good idea stand on its own merits.
tobagganski343

You would make money but how much would one of those garbage cleaning vessels cost to build? Probably quite a bit.
Jax17

How about this idea? There is this great site where inventors and entrepreneurs go to raise money for something they truly believe in. Its called Kickstarter. Now if this isnt a great idea for that, where the whole world can get involved, then I dont know what is.
Mat Duwan

nice invention but 5 year is a long wait but still cool…!
simonb

judge me as u want but this is not enoutgh main part of cleaning sh1t we already made is great no doubt but collecting new somewhere in middle part well there is pleace for creatures to get infected again there is technology that some contrys started to use and it should be used even more in future to prevent from any polution it is plastic that roots its not even plastic as we knew now since that plastic bag just puted on the sun disapears in like 6 moth but yet again it becomes smal particles that we breath i seen technologie that is made with something like wood that has only coal and when it roots it becomes not a polution but even a fertilizers in other words it would help not even at polution but at greenhouses efect too my head is full of ideas not of only what to do but how to do but since i live in small country and my family wasint ritch i will not have an oportunity to change something but i can try writing my ideas that some rich smart man read it and use it to clean this mess we all made
Mr Douche

Fantastic Idea… no its not too late, if it can actually “clean the ocean in 5 years” like its suggesting then that would be absolutely amazing and should be done. If governments donated money to whatever part of the ocean their contries live on then that should definitely help flip the bill but I just simply dont see any governments around the world actually doing that, there is no proffit to be made and the reason they dont case is they see the world as they wont be around to see everything going to shit so they dont even care, or care about their children’s children, just whats happening now.

There is no money to be made here, its purely for the good of the planet, that IS the reward, without our ocean, this planet wouldn’t even exist and that is the under-lining factor. I hope this guy gets funding or someone funds it like Richard Branson who actually would donate money for the good of the planet… This is such an important issue and if this can be fixed, we need to get on it NOW before it actually is too late.
Andrew

2 words to solve your money issues: crowd funding.
Jothron the Wise

This sounds like a great idea, and it would be but there is a problem. The ocean gyres that this would supposedly clean actually don’t contain much detectable plastic rubbish. The rubbish is detectable, but it is always in very small particles that I highly doubt this machine would be able to deal with. On a smaller scale around coastlines of countries that dump rubbish at sea, this would be perfect. The truth is that plastic rubbish takes years to reach the gyres, and in that time it is pulverised by waves and degraded by sunlight, by the time it gets there it is in particle form. If you believe pictures on the internet there is a massive rubbish dump in the middle of the gyre, but this simply isn’t true.