Plastic is forever, and it’s everywhere. And nowhere is it worse than in what’s known as the North Pacific Gyre – the waters north of Hawaii – where there is now more plastic, by weight, than plankton. It’s a huge region of circling currents that concentrate the debris, thousands of miles from land. This floating plastic trash now drifting in the oceans interrupts the feeding of marine life (birds choke on plastic trash, plankton ingest microscopic particles of plastics) and plastics release toxins into the water. That’s the message that Eco-mariner Joel Paschal is hoping to bring to attendees of the 62nd Annual Seattle Boat Show, January 23rd  to February 1st.

In order to raise awareness of the issue, Paschal partnered with Algalita Marine Research Foundation (AMRF) and designed and built a raft constructed from 15,000 plastic bottles, derelict sailboat masts and fishing nets, a solar generator, a wind turbine, and the fuselage of a Cessna aircraft.  In the summer of 2008, Paschal along with Marcus Eriksen of AMRF, sailed the JUNK raft (www.junkraft.com) for 88 days and 2,600 miles (surviving four hurricanes) through plastic impacted water from California to Hawaii.

Organizers of the Seattle Boat Show in turn have partnered with Puget Soundkeeper Alliance (http://www.pugetsoundkeeper.org/) to bring the JUNK raft to the Seattle Boat Show with the goal of educating the Seattle community about the effects of plastic pollution in the marine environment and what can be done to solve this rapidly growing problem.

  “There’s one thing that’s universal to all boaters: we love the water and time spent on it, as life just gets better on a boat,” says Michael Campbell of the Seattle Boat Show. “All boaters have a vested interest in keeping waters as clean as possible.  We’re thrilled to partner with AMFR and Puget Soundkeeper Alliance to raise awareness for this important issue.”

 
“There are over 20,000 man-made chemicals produced by the billions of pounds annually that are dispersed throughout the globe in an open loop of consumption that often ends as waste to be buried, burned or to flow down coastal watersheds out to sea,”  says Paschal.  “Plastic marine debris is one of them, and is the most ubiquitous form of pollution visible around the world. But I’ve also found that recreational boaters are interested in knowing more so that they can be part of the solution, not part of the problem. I’m excited to come to Seattle – one of America’s greenest cities – to help educate what I know will be a receptive audience.”


Solutions include eliminating single-use, disposable plastic from your lifestyle by bringing your own reusable cloth grocery bag to the store, as well as a stainless steel water bottle and coffee mug everywhere you go, and supporting legislation to curb consumption of single-use plastics.