Did you participate in the International Coastal Cleanup this year? We did! Employees, partners, and family members participated in the beach cleanup along the California coast on Saturday, September 21. Many volunteers joined this meaningful event to create something good for both the ocean as a whole and for the local community. As a strong advocate of all kinds of recycling, we are committed to keeping the oceans free of plastic and trash and contributing to a more sustainable environment in any way we can.
This year, we found lots of small polystyrene pieces washed up with wood and seaweed debris, pieces of candy wrappers. We also found a lot of aluminum cans and some plastic bottles – and all those will be recycled. Much of the trash found on the beaches actually come from the rivers leading down to the ocean. As the river water brings the trash into the sea, the waves bring much of it back onto the beach.
The International Coastal Cleanup is an annual event by the Ocean Conservancy, and last year over 1 million people around the world participated in the cleanup, removing over 23 million pounds of plastic from the beaches in one day. Read the full report here. This event started 33 years ago in Texas, and it now includes 122 countries!