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from the https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaCHH5D74Fs dept.
A floating device sent to corral a swirling island of trash between California and Hawaii has not swept up any plastic waste—but the young innovator behind the project said Monday that a fix was in the works.
Boyan Slat, 24, who launched the Pacific Ocean cleanup project, said the speed of the solar-powered barrier isn't allowing it to hold on to the plastic it catches.
"Sometimes the system actually moves slightly slower than the plastic, which of course you don't want because then you have a chance of losing the plastic again," Slat said in an interview with The Associated Press.
A crew of engineers will reach the U-shaped boom Tuesday and will work for the next few weeks to widen its span so that it catches more wind and waves to help it go faster, he said.
The plastic barrier with a tapered 10-foot-deep (3-meter-deep) screen is intended to act like a coastline, trapping some of the 1.8 trillion pieces of plastic that scientists estimate are swirling in the patch while allowing marine life to safely swim beneath it.
They should try hiring dolphins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 19 2018, @12:51AM (5 children)
It's a millennial's project... release it now based on in-depth engineering done on the back of a cocktail napkin, then worry about the dead jellyfish and dolphins later.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bob_super on Wednesday December 19 2018, @01:02AM (3 children)
It's gonna take a lot of iterations to clean a moving area the size of Texas with a 600m barrier using solar propulsion.
I admire the ambition of whoever funded that idea. Hope it collects at least more trash than building and servicing it requires.
Related question: Since less than 15 rivers reject the vast majority of the plastic, shouldn't you put the barrier at the sources, rather than undertake the Sisyphean task of trying to clean after dilution ?
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 19 2018, @01:38AM
Put these in place at those locations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mr._Trash_Wheel [wikipedia.org] You could literally clean up the world.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 19 2018, @08:24AM
Maersk, Deloitte, Boskalis, AkzoNobel, Microsoft, Sabic, DSM, various universities, KLM, Dropbox, Intel... just to name a few.
https://www.theoceancleanup.com/partners/ [theoceancleanup.com] for a full list.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Rivenaleem on Wednesday December 19 2018, @09:49AM
I got the impression that this is a single unit. Maybe when they get it working satisfactorily they will produce more of them?
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday December 19 2018, @06:19PM
Better than the Baby Boomers who are busy sitting on their asses doing nothing.