Plastic Odyssey travels the world!
The Plastic Odyssey is a 40-meter-long ship. It left Marseille on October 1st, 2022, to fight plastic pollution. The journey will last three years.
Right now, the ship is in Chennai, India. Its next stop is the Reunion Islands. The ship will visit 30 coastal countries in 3 continents, staying 3 weeks in each place.
How does Plastic Odyssey help the environment?
Every minute, a garbage truck of plastic goes into the ocean. Simon Bernard, the ship's CEO, says if 20 countries recycle half of their plastic, ocean plastic will go down by 50%.
At every stop, Plastic Odyssey finds 10 local people who want to start recycling businesses. These people stay on the ship for 15 days. They learn how to recycle plastic and meet investors and partners.
To achieve this goal, the ship comes with labs, workshops, display rooms, pyrolysis zones, and training rooms. It is like a floating laboratory.
Simon Bernard encourages these businesses to recycle plastic into building materials like tiles, pipes, and roofs as these products are useful and valuable.
Is Plastic Odyssey eco-friendly?
The ship uses sustainable energy. It has a pyrolysis machine. This machine changes plastic waste into fuel for the ship’s engine. But Simon Bernard says this technology is still new and not ready for big use.
Pyrolysis needs a lot of energy and releases greenhouse gases like carbon monoxide. So, while Plastic Odyssey helps the ocean, it also adds pollution to the air.
Being 100% eco-friendly is hard, but trying to help the planet is still very important.
