Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
contributes to the education and understanding of marine debris. Ocean Conservancy
(OC) and International Coastal Cleanup (ICC) engage people to clean or remove
trash and debris from the beaches and waterways, and also to identify the source of
the plastic debris, and change the behavioural patterns of the public, which leads to
pollution. In addition while cleaning and removing the debris, the volunteers also
record the type of debris they collect. The OC collects the data from the ICC and
compiles and examines it to ind out the major source of the debris and the major
cause for it. These results are used to educate the public, businesses, industries and
government authorities about the debris problem. In 1975, the National Academy
of Science estimated that around 1.4 billion pounds of trash and other solid material
was dumped into the oceans each year and a large proportion of the marine debris
end ups on our beaches. Coastal clean-up carried out on Chennai beaches has (based
on Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy analysis (see Figure 1.3 ) identiied
four types of polymers in the debris namely, PU, PE, PS, and polyester which may be
from plastic bags, cups, foams, food packets and so on.
Every year September 21 st is being celebrated as the ICC Day. Volunteers around
the world take part in this, the world's biggest clean-up event. The irst world beach
clean-up was held in 1986 by the American Centre for Marine Conservation on the
Texas cost with the help of 2,800 volunteers. The major aims of the clean-up includes:
to remove debris from all bodies of water, to collect valuable information about the
debris, to heighten public awareness of the causes of litter and debris, and to make
positive changes and to promote water pollution prevention efforts worldwide.
In the past 25 years nearly 9 million volunteers from 152 countries have cleaned
65.8 million kg of rubbish from shores, lakes, streams and the ocean on just one
day each year. The recent report of 2013 from the OC-ICC presents state-by-state
and country-by-country data about ocean trash collected by volunteers around the
world on one day since 1986, and the data is used to raise awareness and identify
hotspots for debris [26]. Clean-up alone cannot prevent the problem of pollution,
unless plastic is prevented from reaching the water in the irst place.
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