Plan to turn Pacific Trash Vortex into an "island paradise"

[Eldritch]

As we know, there's a raft of floating garbage the size of the United States in the Pacific Ocean, that basically all floating litter that falls to the sea eventually ends up in. Now it seems somebody wants sto do something about it.

One Man's Giant Pacific Garbage Patch Is Another's Beautiful Island Nation



It's an ambitious recycling project to be sure, but Dutch visionaries want to turn the Pacific Garbage Patch into a self-sufficient, green island paradise that draws its resources from the ocean and the garbage floating therein.

"Recycled Island" would be a nearly 4,000-square-mile oasis with three primary goals: to recycle all the plastic floating in the water there, to use that material to establish a seaworthy island, and to ensure the island is self-sustaining. Roughly the size of Hawaii's big island, it would be its own nation with its own laws. Residents of the island would harvest seaweed to create fertilizer for crops and food for fish farms, as well as to make biofuels and medicines. Meanwhile, chemicals could be extracted from the toxic water in the trash patch.

Over time, so the plan says, the island would feed off the patch until it ceased to be the disgusting environmental mess that it is. And while it seems like a pretty far-fetched scheme at this point, organizers are looking to recruit the right scientists that can help them take the first steps toward recycling the patch into useful materials. Even if a paradise island doesn't rise out of the ocean, perhaps by putting their heads together these scientists and engineers will figure out a feasible way to clean up the mess before things get too much worse.

http://www.recycledisland.com/index.html

Recycled island is a research project on the potential of realizing a habitable floating island in the Pacific Ocean made from all the plastic waste that is momentarily floating around in the ocean.

The proposal has three main aims; Cleaning our oceans from a gigantic amount of plastic waste; Creating new land; And constructing a sustainable habitat. Recycled island seeks the possibilities to recycle the plastic waste on the spot and to recycle it into a floating entity. The constructive and marine technical aspects take part in the project of creating a sea worthy island.

The main characteristics of the island are summarized:

1. Realized from the plastic waste in our Oceans. This will clean our Oceans intensely and it will change the character of the plastic waste from garbage to building material. The gathering of the plastic waste will become a lot more attractive.

2. The island is habitable, where it will have its value as land capturing and is a potential habitat for a part of the rising amount of climate refugees.

3. The habitable area is designed as an urban setting. Nowadays already half of the World population lives in urban conditions, which has a huge impact on nature. The realization of mixed-use environments is our hope for the future.

4. The island is constructed as a green living environment, from the point of view of a natural habitat. The use of compost toilets in creating fertile ground is an example in this.

5. It is a self sufficient habitat, which is not (or hardly) depending from other countries and finds its own resources to survive. The settlement has its own energy and food sources.

6. The island is ecologic and not polluting or affecting the world negatively. Natural and non polluting sources are used to let the island exist in harmony with nature.

7. The size of the floating city is considerable in relation to the huge amount of plastic waste in the Ocean. The largest concentration of plastic has a footprint the size of France and Spain together. Starting point is to create an island with the coverage of 10.000Km2. This is about the size of the island Hawaii.

8. The location is the North Pacific Gyre, where at this moment the biggest concentration of plastic waste is discovered. This is geographically a beautiful spot North-East to Hawaii. By recycling and constructing directly on the spot with the biggest concentration of plastic waste, long transports are avoided. Because of the floating character the position could eventually be altered.

[The Lawspeaker]

Activists Want to Turn Ocean Trash Patch Into Hawaii-sized Green Nation




Recycled Island








Living quarters on the island

Located between Hawaii and San Francisco, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is a floating column composed largely of particulate plastic residues that may cover an area twice the size of Texas. Exact determination of size is difficult, due to the inability to image the area with satellite imagery (the particulate polymeric residues which saturate the water are not visible via satellite).

Even as "trash patches" pop up in other oceans, The Netherlands Architecture Fund has dreamed up a wild idea to transform this "dirty" patch into a green paradise. Under its plan, engineers would build "Recycle Island", a floating island nation, from polymers both from the shore and from those harvest from the water. The WHIM architecture firm is collaborating on the project, looking at how an urban paradise could be constructed in the unusual location.

The project has three primary goals. The first is to create on-site recycling of the particles of plastic floating in the water. That would help with the second goal, which would be to establish a stable and seaworthy island. Lastly, the island is to be self-sufficient with its own sustainable food and energy sources.

Under the plan, the island would cover 10,000 km2, roughly the size of Hawaii’s main island. The island would be its own nation, with its own laws. It would sustain agriculture, in part, from "fertile ground" formed from compost toilets. The project founders say it would be an ideal home for "climate refugees".

Ideas floated for power include solar, wave, and wind energies. Seaweed would be farmed for fertilizer, food, fish farm feed, biofuel, CO2 capture, and medicine. Chemicals like ammonia, nitrate, phosphate would be harvested from the water in the trash patch.

The project is starting out small, currently looking to gather samples of the water/plastic mix in the garbage patch. Its organizers are reaching out to recruit chemists and engineers to help figure out the ideal way to recycle the slew into usable material for their envisioned island paradise.

The idea is outlandish and at this point seems unlikely (if merely for economic reasons), but it does seem a charmingly futurist vision. The full project plan can be found here.

The island's "fertile ground" made of seaweed and human manure fertilizer.




A seaweed farm bordering the island

[Piparskeggr]

Um, yeah....

[The Lawspeaker]

I must say that I am amazed by their ideas lol. I wonder how they came up with this ? Wine ? Beer ? Pot ? XTC ? Or all together ?

[Loddfafner]

Well, if Hawaii itself can be turned into a trash patch, I don't see why they can't attempt the reverse process.

[Bloodeagle]

Far out man!
It seems like a rather grandiose project.
I wonder who would back such a large project financially?

These scientists should stop having their meetings in Dutch coffeeshops.

[Albion]

Hmmm...

How much trash would be needed to support the weight of all those buildings? And plastic degrades in salt water and releases toxins, it would pollute quite a few areas of sea due to leaching of the chemicals.
Also the images make it look very inviting, but just who would live on a nation made from trash? How would it take waves, especially Tsunamis or freak waves?

Its a good idea but I don't see anyone putting it into practice. A good idea would be for the nations of the pacific to just have "cleaner boats", litter pickers of the high seas to go clean up the mess and make it a full time task, not just a one-off event.

It has already been done on a smaller scale by a mad Englishman on the Mexican coast, see Spiral Island.

My ideas for ocean colonization involve more permanent and better-made floating islands simply made to the design of a ship with an aesthetic facade of a island complete with woodlands and farmlands.