[mrtrombone]

This has been an interesting discussion but I am surprised at the high level of criticism towards the project. There seems to be two primary critiques of the project:

1. This should not be an area of focus - There are better climate change opportunities to put money towards

2. The project is ineffective and introduces a lot of other environmental problems

For the first point it seems like people are arguing as if it is a binary problem. It isn’t - The threat of climate change / environmental damage is an incredibly complex one that will not be fixed by a single technology / focus/ policy change. For me the questions are a. ’Are existing plastics in our ocean a problem? (yes) b. If someone is passionate about this should they have a crack at improving things? (yes) This is not consuming all the worlds available financing for environmental action so I don’t think wasted resourcing is a particularly good argument. Several commentators also talk about focusing on other ‘lower’ hanging fruit but this is not an objective measure - For a team made up of excellent engineers, oceanographers, fluid dynamics experts etc this may be a lower hanging fruit than trying to implement large scale policy change.

For the second point it comes down to the motivations of the team and their capacity and capability to improve the product. I would presume the team are incredibly passionate about improving the environment and so things like danger to floating marine life, use of diesel in boats etc would absolutely be something they are aware of and actively looking to mitigate. The fact this is (at least) the third iteration demonstrates they are working to improve on what they know is a currently flawed solution - This is development cycle!

This is not to say that critique is bad. Hopefully the team are humble enough to absorb the critique and continue to iterate on their solution to resolve the real issues raised but as long as there is a continued focus on the goal of environmental cleanup and good governance surrounding this I think this is a fantastic project and hopefully it is joined by many more ambitious activities.

[joe_the_user]

I would add that people have noted that the Pacific Garbage Patch is large and has a low density of plastic. I assume that ocean also has a relatively low density of fish altogether but industrial fishing is able to catch a pretty large proportion of these at this point (with beneficial and problem consequences). With plastic not trying to flee and fish moving, it doesn't seems a-priori impossible to create a device that would just skim a large portion of the plastic off.

Of course, unless the world's nation change their policies, this will be moot and environmental destruction generally will accelerate given our present politics. But shitting on this particular project hardly seems a useful way to force this absolutely necessary general change.

[belorn]

> I assume that ocean also has a relatively low density of fish altogether

Interesting assumption but false. The places where fish are located is often pretty dense in fish. That is to say, fish are not evenly distributed. They tend to swim in school of fish, and oceans have vast "desert" areas where the bottom is made of sand and very little else.

The Pacific Garbage Patch is interesting target for cleaning because it has a higher density of plastic compared to other areas. The question is if the density is high. Fishing technique has very little insight to give here beyond technology such as radar and echo sounding, but I am uncertain how effective that would be.

Creating an effective device to clean large swathes of low density ocean is going to require novel designs. For high density areas there are divers, and recreational divers are actually one of the current biggest force in cleaning up water around beaches. The problem is that it does not scale.

[itcrowd]

The threat, some argue, with the Ocean Cleanup is not so much to "traditional", underwater fish, but rather to an obscure floating type of species known as the neuston [1]. Marine biologists are warning about the impact of the OC on this species because so little is understood of their value to marine life.

[1] The entry is very short on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pleuston#Neuston

[gisely]

The Ocean Cleanup's analysis of neuston: https://theoceancleanup.com/updates/the-ocean-cleanup-and-th...

[mcv]

I've heard that argument before, and my reaction then and now is: use this opportunity to study the impact of the neuston on other marine life, and the impact of the ocean cleanup on the neuston.

Saying "we don't know, so we shouldn't do anything" is not productive. We know that all that plastic in the ocean is harmful for some marine life, so we clean it up. You can't postpone all action until you know every possible variable, because you never will. Instead, investigate the neuston, investigate the impact of this cleanup, and re-evaluate after we have more data.

[keanzu]

Here's a guy who saw a problem. Decided to go out and do something about the problem. Raised money from sponsorships and donations. Did something about the problem.

Hard to see what's not to like.

[hanniabu]

Thank you for writing this. You've worded it a lot better and more cordial than I could have as I'm really astonished by the level of ignorance in this thread.

[spookthesunset]

It is the same basic attitude that dismissed Dropbox or the iPod. Software Engineers love to think because their field requires constant learning it somehow translates into their ability to understand and pass judgment on fields outside of their own. I think the term is “engineers disease” and it is super frustrating.

[istjohn]

At the risk of stating the obvious, The Ocean Cleanup has nothing to do with preventing climate change. That's not to say it is or isn't worthwhile.

[hanniabu]

While I agree, it also technically is associated since garbage in the ocean is leading to ecological issues, which through chain events can effectively affect the global ecology, which in turn affects the climate. I'm not saying this is any measurable amount, both due to complexity and relativity, but I think it's also important it's not forgotten that how we treat the environment has far-reaching affects one the food chain (and fauna) is affected.

[hinkley]

Have we got a clever word for rejecting one cause in favor of another? ”Whataboutism“ seems to miss the mark here.

The world is a big place, there are a lot of things that contribute to problems. I dunno why so many people think there is one way to solve them, or that pursuit of that priority should obviate all others.

For one, what if you’re wrong? If you haven’t hedged your bets you have to start from scratch, maybe undo what you’ve done first. Big problems require many solutions, not big solutions.

I mean, I don’t personally see how they’ll ever get the numbers to work, but you can’t have a marketplace for ideas and then evict everyone. There are some ideas that are similar to these that seem to actually work already, like the giant mesh bags over drain pipes. Who knows where inspiration will come from.

[keanzu]

> Have we got a clever word for rejecting one cause in favor of another?

Either/or thinking, false dilemma, false dichotomy, false binary

Any of those resonate?

[p1necone]

I see this particular brand of whataboutism a lot. It seems glaringly obvious to me that they're arguing in bad faith.

[Sangama34]

> This should not be an area of focus - There are better climate change opportunities to put money towards

People who put money should decide the area of focus. Not others.

> The project is ineffective and introduces a lot of other environmental problems

This achievement matters and useful in itself. May be they can figure it out how to scale or will find more commercially viable products from this sort of technology.