Tagged: plastic pollution

Empower the complainers

How are you all doing? It has been a while since my last post, which solicited a lot of responses. Thanks a lot for that! It was exactly my goal to stir up the debate around our consumerism-centred economy. While that post focused a lot on problems, I want to turn back to a vision for solutions today. I want to make a case to empower the complainers around us to become doers… the doers who will solve the societal and environmental challenges of the 21st century.

I presented this vision last week at the World Resources Forum Conference –  a gathering of scientists, industry leaders, and policymakers to discuss innovative use of materials and resources. Based on my experience from the citizen’s initiative fighting plastic waste, that I have set up with a couple of friends in Brussels, I showed that bottom-up solutions can turn the impossible into possible. In what follows, a slightly adapted version of what I told the men and women in suits last Tuesday. Enjoy!

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The movement that is turning waste into precious material

Ever since I stepped into a Fabrication Laboratory (FabLab) stuffed with laser cutters and 3D printers in my home university in Leuven, I have been intrigued by the idea that all of us have the possibility to built stuff. Just think about it: for millennia, our economies have been driven by craftsmen and -women that imagined, prototyped, and built their wares from A to Z. With the industrial revolution and the advent of conveyor belts, humankind has largely alienated from making things. The Maker-community, as the people craftings objects are often referred to, turns the tables again by democratising prototyping and production techniques.

I recently stumbled upon a particularly nice project that hit several soft spots of mine. First of all, it works with plastic trash and turns it back into a raw material. Secondly, it develops hardware to easily set up a small production facility with shredders, extrusion and injection moulding machines. Thirdly, all of it is open source. Fourthly, they dream big.

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Ocean plastics: where to fight them first?

I am sure you all have seen those heart-sickening pictures of dead albatrosses on the beaches of the Galapagos Islands. Between what remains from their deck of feathers, plastic bottle caps are bulking out of their stomachs. The issue of plastic pollution in the world’s oceans is reaching alarming rates with far-reaching impacts. It seems that finally, the issue has reached the greater public thanks to mind-boggling footage in documentaries like the Plastic Ocean, and the renowned BBC series Blue Planet II. Better late than never. If the little sea turtles tangled up in an abandoned fisher net didn’t pull you over the line, the danger of microplastics building up in the fish on your plate surely should get you onboard the fight against ocean plastics. But you might be wondering… where to start?

The Philippines have a huge waste mismanagement problem, leading to tonnes of plastic being dumped into the ocean every year

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Plastics – our dirty addiction

Cofee, games, fitness, Netflix, or beer. It seems to be very human to have your own peculiar addiction. There is one product none of us can’t get enough of: plastic. Once hailed as a revolution, it is now quickly becoming one of mankind’s biggest health hazards. Last week I went to a screening of the documentary ‘A Plastic Ocean’ in Brussels. Preceded by a panel discussion between director Craig Leeson, marine biologist Richard Thompson, activists Hugo Tagholm and Maria Westerbos, and CEO of Klean Kanteen Jim Osgood. It was an eye-opening evening for me. This is what I take away.

The screening of the documentary was preceded by a panel discussion. From left to right: Leeson, Tagholm, Westerbos, Thompson, Oswood, Beck (own photo).

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