"Humankind created the problem, I will solve it!" These are the words with which the newly nineteen-year-old Boyan Slat declared war on the Pacific Trash Vortex, the gigantic island of waste that has accumulated in the Pacific Ocean for about forty years.
This enormous marine dump began to form in the early 1980s when, due to the ocean current, non‐biodegradable waste started accumulating in the Pacific Ocean between the 135º and 155º West meridian and between the 35º and 42º North parallel, essentially between California and Hawaii.


The extent of this "ecological monster" is not precisely known: the most optimistic estimates speak of 700,000 km² (comparable in size to the Iberian Peninsula!), while the most catastrophic ones estimate over 10 million km² (almost as much as the United States of America!). The estimated density of plastic, on the other hand, is 3.34 × 10^6 fragments per km², with the concentration of plastic microdebris in some areas appearing to surpass that of plankton.

Due to the non‐biodegradability of plastic, the Pacific Trash Vortex would take about 72 million years to "self‐cleanse", but if the Ocean Clean Up project by the young Boyan Slat succeeds, within 5 years as much as 50% of the waste could be disposed of and recycled and, in the event of success, it could be extended to all the world's seas. The cleanup project involves using a system of machinery devised by Slat himself and refined by teams of scientists and engineers. The system consists of a chain of floating barriers, two kilometers in length, placed in favor of the current (exactly the same current that led to the creation of the island!) that funnel the plastic toward various platforms that act as funnels, or rather, collectors, to which, on a monthly basis, vessels capable of collecting the debris will proceed.

According to Boyan Slat himself, the Ocean Clean Up could trigger a domino effect of majestic projects for the safeguarding of the ecosystem, and humankind would finally begin to use technology to improve the environmental conditions of our planet!
To promote and support the protection of the environment and the marine ecosystem, PSS Worldwide has established the WED project (an acronym for: "Water - Enviroment – Divers").