Discarded marine plastic is very harmful but communities in Clare have the potential to turn this into an economic opportunity.
Circular Ocean is a European project that aims to support the move to a more circular economy and inspire remote communities within Clare to realise the economic opportunities of discarded marine plastic, in particular, fishing nets and ropes. By doing this waste plastic from the sea will be turned into a useful resource. Circular Ocean will then work with local communities assisting them with initiatives to set up enterprises in relation to recycling the old marine waste and creating new products with them.
It has been estimated that over 8 million tonnes of marine litter ends up in the ocean every year, of which 15% is floating on the surface, 15% is washed ashore and the remaining 70% sinks and rests on the ocean floor. Fishing related gear has been assessed by experts to be the most harmful type of litter to seabirds, mammals, and turtles, with the economic damage of marine plastic waste estimated almost €12 billion.
A report will be published by Circular Ocean and outline the potential impact of marine plastic litter, which due to its durability may take hundreds to thousands of years to fully breakdown. As a result, plastic is continuing to accumulate in the ocean, with research suggesting that it may contain 155 million tonnes of plastic by 2025 without significant intervention. This plastic will continue to entangle and be consumed by marine life, which has significant implications for the overall health of marine ecosystems and food-web.
Over the next three years the project partners, are working with local enterprises and residents in County Clare to provide and share information, knowledge and ideas to guide communities on how best to harness the hidden opportunities of discarded fishing nets.
The development of eco-innovative ideas, learning and sharing of knowledge will be disseminated to entrepreneurs, the general public, and politicians, and will ultimately help the project partners to support the creation of social enterprises. This will be achieved partly through open source, free-to-use resources including feasibility studies on fishing net collection, environmental impact reports, case studies of existing projects, information on fishing net reuse and recycling options and examples of pilot work undertaken using fishing nets. The highly informative, and easy to navigate project web site has been developed to provide a one-stop access point to all these forthcoming resources.
Partners involved in the Circular Ocean project include the Environmental Research Institute of the North Highland College UHI, Scotland; Macroom E, Ireland; The Centre for Sustainable Design, University for the Creative Arts, England; the Arctic Technology Centre, Greenland and the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Norway.
To find out more on Circular Ocean, watch this short animation.