Updates

General

European Commission Appoints Boyan Slat as Board Member of Horizon Europe’s Healthy Ocean Mission

Boyan Slat, CEO of The Ocean Cleanup, has been appointed as one of the board members of the ocean mission in the European Commission’s Horizon Europe program. The mission of…

Oceans

System 001/B – The Mission Plan

In our last update, we shared the modifications to our system design and how we plan to test them in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch this summer. Now, only one month…

Environment, Research

Mission One Environmental Monitoring Results Available

The Ocean Cleanup is developing advanced technologies to rid the world’s oceans of plastic. The passive drifting system, also known as System 001 or “Wilson”, was deployed in the Great…

Engineering, Oceans

System Design Upgrades Completed, to be Relaunched in June

After the root cause analysis was finalized, the engineering team began working on solutions that we can start trialing in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in June. The upgraded design,…

Environment, Oceans, Research

Whales likely impacted by Great Pacific Garbage Patch

A scientific note we published on April 09, 2019 reports the records of whales within the world’s largest accumulation of floating ocean plastic: the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Over the…

Engineering, Oceans

System 001 Learnings – Root Causes Summarized

In September, we launched our first system, with the aim of achieving proof of technology and commencing cleanup. Twenty years after the discovery of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, this…

Discussion, Environment, General

The Ocean Cleanup and the Neuston

On January 22, an opinion piece was published in The Atlantic, originally titled “The Ocean Cleanup Project Could Destroy the Neuston.” Since preventing the destruction of ocean ecosystems is the…

Research

Where Mismanaged Plastic Waste is Generated and Possible Paths of Change

As we kick off 2019, the engineering team is working towards solutions to the challenges we face with System 001, while the research team remains focused on the study of…

Oceans, Research

Chasing Plastics: How to Close the Ocean Plastic Mass Balance

At The Ocean Cleanup we believe that you cannot solve a problem if you do not fully understand it. For this reason, we have put extensive efforts into fundamental plastic…

Oceans

Wilson to Return to Port for Repair and Upgrade

Due to a structural malfunctioning of the cleanup system, today we made the decision to return to port earlier than planned. We will set sail as soon as an appropriate…