QUICK SUMMARY & QUOTES
ROZ SAVAGE, British ocean rower, environmental campaigner, and keynote speaker
It takes around 5 million oarstrokes to cross the ocean – one little action at a time by individuals goes a long way towards making changes.
- As human beings evolved we have forgotten that we are part of nature, and the crux is to re-connect with nature. After all, we are supposed to be the intelligent species on this planet
- In terms of finding out solutions either a top down policy approach or bottoms up grassroots approach helps. Sometimes it’s a combination of both
- Our culture makes it OK for us to treat non-human nature the way we are treating it now
- We look at civilization as the pinnacle of achievement – we have to think beyond civilization in order to create an alternate and better vision
You don’t replace the existing paradigm by fighting the paradigm, but by creating a new paradigm which is exciting and which is where everyone wants to be.
- The quest is all about creating the new and exciting vision which will help people rally towards it and involve everybody
- We as a society don’t realize our actions make such a difference, but every single one of us has to contribute for making a change
MARCUS ERIKSEN, co-founder and research director for the 5 Gyres Institute, which studies the distribution of plastics in the world’s oceans and in the Great Lakes in the United States.
- In the oceans, there are no consolidated patches of plastics, it’s more like a smog of small particles, like the particles of space debris circulating in the high atmosphere
- Many environment issues are out of sight, out of mind. Plastic pollution is easier to talk about than climate change, because plastic pollution is so ubiquitous on land.
- Distribution of waste is a navigational hazard in space as well as in the oceans, and it’s also an aesthetic loss. People don’t want to imagine a sky full of trash. Something is lost when our waste remains in wild spaces.
- We have to educate by living by example. There has to be constant pressure for organizations to create change in the products life cycle. For example, the microbeads campaigns to remove the plastics in toothpaste eventually led to legislation banning these harmful micro-beads.
We have to envision living in closed system – where we can’t absorb all the trash. We’re up against this wall of a closed system, of resource scarcity.
- Research has shown that plastic pieces become smaller and fragmented down into micro-particles and nano-particles they ultimately get settled on the sea-bed or may even be deposited in a beach near you.
- Asking manufactures for end-of-life plan for plastic products!
- Communicating the beauty of the intrinsic value, creating media content, expeditions and creating research articles helps in creating awareness and reaching out to more people.
- A couple of Swedish scientists found that polystyrene nano-particles affect the mobility of larvae fish and creates great harm to the ecosystem.
- Styrofoam cups and plates break down to become polystyrene. That polystyrene breaks down into styrene monomers and fills up our beaches. Styrene is a suspected human carcinogen, and our exposure to that is through marine debris, through fish ingesting small particles of polystyrene, through people eating on Sytrofoam plates and cups.
- We should be smart about the products we use and how we use it in our ecosystem
SOURABH KAUSHAL, Founder of Space Debris Nexus
- More than a million particles of space debris and theory are travelling at the speed of around 17000 miles and this in turn causes great hazard as they become projectiles hurtling through space
- Very few scientists work on space debris and this is one of the major area where awareness need to be created
Space debris are hurting through space at more than 17000miles/hr causing them to become projectiles and a big threat to manned and un-manned missions
- Big threat to both manned and un-manned mission to space – there are micro-particles and nano-particles just floating though space
- Countries like Sweden are investing in innovative solution to this and creating de-orbiting kit solutions
- In India especially in North India there is a huge problem of plastics and lack of awareness on how to recycle or replace plastic products
Make people aware of this problem and educate people and look at technological solution convert or process plastics.