The Clean Ocean Project is calling with some effectful visuals for your help to sign a petition against the planned oil spill around the Canary Islands. Some great artworks and ideas visualize the effects on nature.
The enterprise of Repsol plans to use for the drilling 616.060 hectare of the east coast of Fuerteventura and Lanzarote, amount of nearly 2.5 times the size of these two islands. The company seems to ignore the fact that some of that area belongs to the Natural Reserve of Biosphere and that in 2004 the Maritime International Organization declared this part of the ocean as especially sensitive.
Sign the petition here or visit their Blog here.
Smaller expeditions have come across the patch before, but researchers from Project Kaisei and the Scripps Environmental Accumulation of Plastic Expedition ( SEAPLEX ) journeyed through the entire area, collecting samples the whole way. The plastic trash is difficult to visualize from satellites since much of it consists of tiny plastic flecks beneath the surface of the ocean. Among the upsetting things seen by the team: barnacles attached to plastic bottles, and crabs, sea anemones, and sponges living alongside the trash. And while the expedition covered 1,700 miles, members of the Kaisei team say the patch could be much, much larger.