Just when we thought that we had hit rock bottom and there is hardly any opportunity to revive the mistakes that humans have already committed towards nature, a ray of hope appeared promising better and cleaner days. According to reports, there is a massive patch of plastic debris of plastic wastes that rest on the bed of the Pacific Ocean, somewhere around the Northeast of Hawaii; and it was mainly the ocean currents that encouraged this massacre to pile upon one another.

Even though it is commonly referred to as “The Great Pacific Garbage Patch,” sometimes it is also known by the name of “The North Pacific Gyre.” If the claims are to be believed, this is one of the largest ecosystems that ever dwelled on the face of the earth with its realms stretching up to millions of kilometers. To give you a clearer idea of magnanimity, the size of the Great Garbage Patch can be equated with that of Queensland, Australia.

In the present times, one of the most significant issues that have been continuously raising alarms is plastic pollution in oceans. As the children of the earth, it is our responsibility to rid of all the adulteries that have been accumulating on the earth’s surface for so long. Thankfully our desires are no more just a tab of wishful thinking; people, in reality, are working their ways towards the betterment.

Collected trash from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch for recycling.

After wreaking havoc on its own, plastic pollution has moved on to generate graver repercussions in the form of micro-plastic pollution, whose level of contamination is beyond our control. As per the data circulated by scientists from the USA, Chile, Australia, New Zealand, and France, there are about 5.25 tons of plastic particles swimming in the ocean, and interestingly, a significant portion of them is constituted by microplastics.

After discovering the patch in the 90s, scientists believed that it would take thousands of years to clean it up but, Boyan Slat defied this assumption and stated at the TEDx talk that he could do it in less than ten years once he has his special equipment ready to be employed. Besides crowdfunding, he received near about $2.2 million from investors to bring Slat’s ideas to life and remove every speck of plastic from the Pacific Ocean.

After dedicating one year to analyze the proficiency of the proposition and machinery, The Ocean Cleanup organization affirmed that their System 001/B vessel is started collecting and discarding of plastic debris successfully from the sea bed. The system capitalizes on the natural forces of the waves in the ocean to draw the plastic in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

This idea was first put forward by the creator himself in 2012, and people are more than elated to see this project take shape and are patiently waiting for its results. Other than collecting the dull shreds of plastic, System 001/B vessel is also assembling microplastics as small as 1 millimeter leaving the organization in pleasant surprise.