OpenOceans Global
Contrary to popular belief, the vast majority of ocean plastic is found on coastlines (below the high tide line), and most of that reaches the ocean via rivers. OpenOceans Global is a nonprofit organization based in San Diego, California focused on mapping the coastlines persistently fouled by plastic to provide a globally visual context to the problem. In addition, OpenOceans Global is also curating and categorizing the best solutions to the ocean plastic crisis. These solutions range from global collaborations, to innovative recycling processes, to technologies that can simply intercept the plastic in rivers and streams before it can reach the ocean. While much of the work on ocean plastic has rightly focused on the producer and consumer (don't make it, don't buy it or use it), OpenOceans Global believes an immediate step that can be taken is to prioritize the places where the most plastic reaches the ocean, determine the source, and provide the the experts and the leaders for each location with the best known solutions to address that source. While the all-important and encouraging efforts move forward to create an international plastic treaty, the plastic still flows. The Pew Charitable Trusts and SYSTEMIQ in their July 2020 landmark report, Breaking the Plastic Wave, estimated that 11 million metric tons of plastic reaches the ocean now and, by 2040, 29 million metric tons will reach the ocean with current practices in place. The Pew report provides an excellent and comprehensive list of what needs to done. That list requires billions of dollars in government investment and trillions of dollars in business investment. Even if all the countries with coastlines and all the businesses involved do everything Pew recommends, only 78% of the plastic flows to the ocean will be stopped, a number that is nearly equal to the amount of plastic reaching the ocean only a few years ago. As the research on ocean plastic emerges, the world is learning that 84% of river-borne ocean plastic comes from Brazil and nine countries in Asia. 70% comes from five countries in Asia, and 36% comes from the Philippines alone. Wouldn't it make sense to focus on these primary sources of plastic to the ocean, even while a global plastic treaty is being forged and best practices like those recommended by Pew are implemented? OpenOceans Global is confident that once the places where ocean plastic accumulates on coastlines are identified and visualized, the effort, interest and funding will emerge to address those locations and sources now, even while the issue is being addressed globally. Finally, OpenOceans Global is addressing the difficulty of communicating across timezones and distance by providing a 24/7 virtual meeting space, where experts and leaders can convene simply and easily. Called Talk Space, this virtual meeting center contains everything from a lobby, to breakout rooms, to a theater with seating for up to 5,000. This space for informal and formal gatherings is the final pillar in our strategy to link together the global plastic experts and leaders.

Purpose

At OpenOceans Global we don’t believe science is enough. Science is about inquiry, not always solutions. We don’t believe education is enough. Education is about telling stories. What has been missing is the global sense of community that we must embrace to solve global problems.

At OpenOceans Global, we do not aspire to be the heroes solving the ocean crises. We aspire to recognize unify the people who are facing common problems like plastic and trash so we can stop the source of the problems and actually move forward to solve them.

There are three pillars to our process.

  1. Global Context. Identify the problems and put them in a global context on a GIS map so people can see that they are part of that global community.
  2. Unifying People. Identify and link together in a social network the people working on the problem, whether they be scientists, environmentalists, government workers, elected officials, business operators, or just people who care.
  3. Best Practices. From that network, find the best practices, the solutions that will be required to solve the problems and empower the global network to implement them.

VISION. A world where ocean crises have been solved.

MISSION. To solve ocean crises by unifying and empowering global communities by sharing and visualizing accurate information and solutions.

DEFINITION OF THE OCEAN. Our definition of the “ocean” includes the confluence of the sea with the world’s watersheds, the water cycle and the ocean’s interactions with the atmosphere and climate.

Carl Nettleton

President/Founder, OpenOceans Global

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