Saturday, September 15, 2007

International Coastal Cleanup Day

Today was International Coastal Cleanup Day! California's cleanup volunteers alone have already reported over 400,000 pounds of trash cleaned from the state coast today! That is just one state- and they are not done counting yet! It is estimated that up to 100 countries participated- imagine how much that will add up to! Information was recorded about the different kinds of trash collected to help us better understand where the trash comes from.
If you had the opportunity to participate let us know about what you found! I brought home the BBQ grill and the plastic sword I cleaned off the beach today!
If you didn't get a chance to participate today don't worry! Unfortunately, there will still be more trash on the beach tomorrow and even more importantly there is always the opportunity to do your part to make sure trash doesn't make it into the ocean in the first place!

Here is a link to information about ongoing cleanup events.

2 comments:

Luis Antonio Pinto said...

Do you know if there has been any study about what causes people to throw garbage anywhere and if education and laws against littering have produced any effect on the people?
When reading that:
"California's cleanup volunteers alone have already reported over 400,000 pounds of trash cleaned from the state coast today!" doesn´t give much hope.

ORV Alguita said...

Indeed, the amount of plastic debris that washes up along the coast daily is little cause for optimism. I think a study of what causes people to pollute and the effectiveness of laws in changing those behaviors would certainly be interesting.
Here in California a bill just passed the legislature that would require all plastic product manufacturers to use best management practices, such as proper storage and clean-up procedures to prevent plastic pellet "nurdle" spillage. Hopefully if this law passes it will be effective in reducing the amount of pre production plastic pellets entering the watershed.