A professional yacht racer has designed a brand new type of sailboat that is powered almost entirely by the plastic waste it discovers in the ocean.
Yves Bourgnon started the SeaCleaners Project as way of fighting back against ocean plastic pollution, which is now one of the biggest environmental disasters the world faces. The sailing vessel is known as the Manta, due to its shape resembling that of a manta ray.
The new design means that the Manta takes in plastic floating in the sea and pushes it into an incinerator. The incinerator then powers the boat's electric engine. The ship does require some crew members to sort through the plastic before it is incinerated.
The plastic itself is captured by a conveyor belt and by three large nets that are dragged behind the ship. The nets are so fine they can capture plastic as small as 10 millimetres across and are designed to pose no threat to sea-life.
At 56 metres (184 feet), it would be the largest vessel running on waste products afloat anywhere in the world, and it is hoped that it will serve as an inspiration to other boat production companies.
The Manta also uses solar panels and small wind turbines as an energy backup when no plastic is available. Energy is stored in batteries that are charged through the plastic and green-energy mechanisms.
The boat itself hasn't yet been built, but it is hoped a prototype will be constructed soon. Bourgnon himself estimates that just 400 such ships could remove a third of the Earth's discarded ocean plastic.
Plastic pollution mostly comes from commercial shipping and fishing vessels but also from the land as it is washed into the sea by rivers. Plastic kills wildlife when they get trapped in it, but there is also the problem of animals ingesting the plastic and causing huge internal damage. As the plastic does not biodegrade, it can kill one animal and then be eaten by another animal in the future. Many scientists are now working on building plastics that biodegrade within seawater to avoid these problems.
[h/t: Good News Network]
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