Surfrider Surfbox

Plastic Origins Back-story

Plastic Origins is a project initiated by the not-for-profit Surfrider Foundation Europe in search of solutions to address the source of ocean pollution. Supported by citizens, associations, scientists, and socially responsible companies, the Plastic Origins project aims to map plastic pollution in European rivers by applying participatory science and Artificial Intelligence technology. This mapping data helps to identify areas of high impact, gain a deeper understanding of the problem on the field, and measure the evolution of pollution over time as well as to raise awareness among political decision-makers on the local, national, and European levels and urge them to act. It's a hot topic, here is why:

• Plastic pollution is the second biggest threat to our Ocean after climate change.
• Ocean plastic pollution mainly comes from terrestrial sources. Rivers are pathways for litter entering the ocean. For instance, a bottle lost in Paris city might end-up in the Seine River and reach the sea.
• Investigating river plastic pollution helps to localize plastic inputs and monitor trends, improvements and measures efficiency.
• There is currently no obligation for European countries to monitor river plastic pollution. The European water framework directive does not include plastic pollution as an indicator for good environmental status.

Mapping from several sources

Since it's inception, Plastic Origins has grown to platform with several pieces:

• The Plastic Origins service (and database)m
• The Plastic Origins mobile app (Android and iOS), that allow any citizen to help Surfrider map the plastic pollution
• The Trashroulette app allows citizens to help Surfrider classify training data
• The Plastic Origins AI, trained to recognize, track and count plastic waste in still and video images.

All these projects are open-source, and available on GitHub.

The Surf Box

While the Plastic Origins App is really useful and has already proven to be an effective way to collect data and map plastic pollution, it's hard to ask volunteers to take pictures at the same place on the regular basis.