Newport, Rhode Island, has also found a cause close to home. ‘It started when I got into fishing from the shore,’ he says. ‘We have a wonderful shoreline around Newport, but it’s depressing to see the amount of litter that’s being left behind including fishing gear packaging and line, along with single-use food wrappers and coffee cups – unfortunately it’s pretty obvious that shore-based fishermen are responsible for most of it.’
transportation, and they end up in our waterways and on our shores. In fact so many get lost in transit that nurdles are the second-largest direct source of marine microplastic pollution in the world, after the dust from car tyres. About 250,000 tons of them get into our oceans every year – and many of these are entering the food chain. Sea turtles, whooping cranes and fish have been found starved to death with their bellies full of nurdles. The pellets become porous over time and can absorb high levels of contaminants,
E.coli bacteria and toxins, which scientists are concerned could pass up the food chain to humans. ‘I’m focusing on nurdles because they’re the most easily controllable form of plastic pollution,’ Kratzig says. ‘Nearly all the billions of nurdles that end up in our coastal waters escape during transfer. And in the US, there is no strong legislation.’
Nurdles are easy to distinguish from other microplastics, Kratzig says, and her grant is funding Nurdle Patrol, run by the Mission-Aransas National Estuarine Research
Top:
pro sailor Anthony Kotoun is working with volunteers from Mystic Aquarium to engage with fishermen to prevent or reduce debris from entering water systems. Above: plastic pellets are a major pollution concern. Match racer and coach Elizabeth Kratzig is working with Nurdle Patrol on developing a mapping website to help identify the sources of plastic pellet pollution
Reserve, which tracks and maps the distribution of nurdles around the Gulf of Mexico. It’s a citizen science project that relies on members of the public spending 10 minutes counting nurdles when they go to the beach and then emailing or uploading the count to the
Nurdlepatrol.org website. Thus far, the record is a shocking 30,846 nurdles collected by one person in just 10 minutes in Galveston Bay. By comparing nurdle counts sent in by thousands of people, from hundreds of locations, marine biologists at Mission-Aransas can gauge the severity of pollution and map the data to create a picture of the overall problem. Nurdle pollution is almost everywhere, unfortunately, but for Kratzig it is particularly close to home: one of the biggest producers, Formosa Plastics, has a huge factory right next to her family’s ranch and an estimated 75 billion nurdles have found their way into the adjoining creek. A recent lawsuit against the company brought by Texas residents used Nurdle Patrol data as evidence of Clean Water Act violations and successfully proved the company had polluted Texas waterways with its nurdles. Formosa Plastics agreed to pay a $50 million settlement and change its practices to help prevent future spills.
Huge concentrations of nurdles are often found near factories that produce or use them. By mapping their distribution and highlighting the places with the highest concentrations, Nurdle Patrol is gathering evidence that can help identify the sources of the pollution – and hold manufacturers accountable.
Anthony Kotoun, a multi-class world champion and 11th Hour Racing ambassador based in
Kotoun’s solution is a partnership with Mystic Aquarium, funding a programme that helps volunteers patrol the coast and gives them the resources and knowledge they need to communicate effectively with the fishermen. A grant from 11th Hour Racing will train and support the volunteers, who cover a long stretch of coast from Connecticut to Massachusetts. ‘It’s better to prevent than to react, so that’s what this programme is about,’ Kotoun says. A new recruit to 11th Hour Racing’s group of ambassadors is the French Ultime skipper François Gabart, a Vendée Globe winner and current singlehanded round-the-world record holder. ‘Like a lot of sailors I care deeply about the state of the ocean and the future of the planet,’ he says. ‘The ocean’s health has a huge impact on the environment. It affects all people, even those who live in the mountains.’
Gabart’s 40-strong team is already serious about sustainability: moving into a building powered by solar energy, using life cycle assessment on new Ultime and Imoca builds, and reducing single-use plastics to an absolute minimum. Beyond winning races, he sees the technical innovation of ocean racing teams as a means of acquiring knowledge that can one day be used for freight and even passenger transport. ‘Like everyone else, we need to be more sustainable,’ he says. ‘But as sailors we should be proud of what we achieve with renewable energy.’ He reckons a good way to make yacht racing more sustainable is to introduce an environmental handicap rating system that rewards sustainable practices and encourages teams to use materials such as biocomposites instead of carbon fibre.
‘I’ve become an ambassador for 11th Hour Racing because their message is important,’ Gabart says. ‘I saw what they did in the last Volvo Ocean Race; they have a good set of tools and a great platform to spread the message. I support other environmental causes too, but I am focusing on this one. We don’t have much time left, we’ve got to act now.’
www.11thhourracing.org
q SEAHORSE 73
MISSION-ARANSAS NERR
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