Plastic Pollution
When you give today you are protecting and saving the lives of 267 marine species that are harmed and killed by plastic pollution in our ocean. Your support is vital to more than 1,000 Shoreline Cleanups we enable each year, and it allows the scaling up of key research and innovations that move industry leaders to take action to prevent millions of microfibers from entering our ocean.
No act is too small – yours today can truly save a life.
It’s hard to truly comprehend what it must be like for a seal that is entangled by our waste like the one pictured above. One moment they are playfully gliding alongside their herd through the cold ocean waters, and then without notice they feel something snag and choke against their skin.
Can you imagine what it must be like twisting and turning, trying to break free as your breath strains, but it won’t come off? You don’t know what it is, and you can’t be rid of it. It’s sad to imagine that with humans dumping so much plastic and pollution in our waters, we may have a greater effect on these magnificent animals then their predators. In fact, approximately 267 species have been affected by plastic pollution worldwide. This includes 86% of all sea turtle species, 44% of all seabird species and 43% of all marine mammal species.
Without intervention, entanglement worsens as seals grow and the plastic doesn’t. It cuts deeper, making every movement painful, they struggle to hunt as they’re slower, weaker and in some cases, infection sets in.
But what if you could remove the plastic before it causes this suffering?
This is why your kind intervention today is critical. When you give today, you’re supporting our Shoreline Cleanups and critical work in our Plastics Lab, which can prevent the unnecessary suffering of marine life and restore our ocean.
Seals and other marine life aren’t only harmed by entanglement. Every day they are ingesting millions of microfibers and plastic from our clothing and waste that is eaten by tiny marine creatures like zooplankton and moves up the food web.
No action is too small in preventing the harms to animals and our ocean. Your gift can remove plastics from our shores and support critical research that informs systematic change in industry and government. Reducing microfibers and plastics in our ocean.
Last year alone we supported more than 1,060 cleanups across North America that prevented painful entanglements. Thanks to decades of data and state of the art equipment our research has also motivated clothing brands like Arc’teryx and Patagonia to move forward with initiatives that can prevent millions of microfibers from entering our ocean each year.
