Blog Post #1

Water pollution is a prominent global issue affecting all types of bodies of water. It impacts the beauty as well as the ecosystem and health of the environment.

According to American Rivers, about 22 billion plastic bottles are collected annually in rivers. Pollutants flow from inland sources of water into our oceans, so reducing the amount of waste in local lakes, ponds, and rivers will in turn reduce the amount in the oceans.

There are current large scale solutions such as trash skimmers, like in the image to the right, to combat this problem. These skimmers operate on large scale trash collection that float on the surface.

Debating on how to tackle such a worldwide problem on a smaller scale, our team decided to focus on smaller bodies of water such as slow-moving rivers, lakes, and ponds. These types of areas are heavily polluted by people visiting for their own leisure throughout the year. Working on a smaller scale promotes the feasibility of our design as well as creating accessibility to the average person as a form of ecotourism.

Another issue our team faced in narrowing the problem is the depth of where the waste is located. There is a lot of sunken trash that affects the chemistry of the water. However, there is also a variety of plastics that float on the surface and just below it. We will be focusing on cleaning up surface debris as it is more accessible.

Our project idea is an attachment that will be put on small pedal boats that will clean up trash as the boat moves. This device will be powered by either the mechanical action of pedaling or by the flow of the water, which are both environmentally intrinsically friendly through the fact that it does not generate any pollution from motors and such. Our solution would mitigate surface debris, impacting both the aesthetic and health of the wildlife in the area.