Curbing our plastic problem is no small task. That’s why the Plastic Pollution Coalition is giving away $50,000 to businesses working towards decreasing our plastic dependency.

Plastic Pollution Coalition, a global alliance working towards a world free of plastic pollution and its toxic impacts on people, animals and the environment, created the Think Beyond Plastic competition for innovative entrepreneurs working on solutions to the world’s serious plastic crisis.

The amount of plastic on the planet is nothing short of alarming. Each year, around 300 million tons of plastic is produced globally. Here in the U.S., only about the half number of plastic bottles produced wind up in recycling centers. The rest creep into crowded landfills, or our vulnerable oceans, creating serious harm to animals and ecosystems. Chris Jordan (Running the Numbers) has documented this tragedy as it’s impacting the helpless residents of Midway Island to a tear-jerking degree in his forthcoming film, “Midway: A Love Story For Our Time From the Heart of the Pacific.”

“Plastic pollution is a problem that the world has just begun to comprehend. Recycling is not an adequate solution to the increasing consumption of disposable plastic. We seek disruptive solutions that will reduce the planetary plastic footprint,” said Daniella Russo, co-founder and executive director of Plastic Pollution Coalition.

The global alliance, which was formed in 2009, has caught the attention of some major media outlets, companies, festivals and foundations. Jann Wenner, Editor and Publisher of Rolling Stone Magazine and one of the Think Beyond Plastic partners said, “Plastic pollution is a major environmental problem, and we are excited about engaging the spirit of entrepreneurship in the solutions.” Other partners for the contest include Apogee Digital, Bonnaroo, Conservation International, One PacificCoast Bank, FSB, The Sam and Peggy Grossman Foundation, and Tabor Communications.

Entrepreneurs working on products, services, materials and infrastructure solutions that can lead to a widespread decline in use of plastics are encouraged to apply. One existing business will receive $50,000 and the most innovative business concept will receive $10,000. The prizes are being underwritten by the Netherlands A-Spark Good Ventures, an investment company. Winners will be decided by Eben Bayer (Ecovative), Mike Biddle (MBA Polymers), Julie Corbett (Ecologic), Adam Lowry (Method), Dr. Ramani Narayan (Michigan State University), Mike Velings (A-Spark Good Ventures) and Adam Werbach (Yerdle). Submissions must be received by March 10^th and the winners  will be announced at ceremonies in June in Berkeley, California.

For more information, view the competition trailer here.

Keep in touch with Jill on Twitter @jillettinger

Image: tompagenet

The post Innovation Competition Aims at Reducing Global Plastic Pollution Problem appeared first on EcoSalon.

Yes, that’s an N.W.A. reference. Here’s another, less controversial one:

“Once a journey is designed, equipped, and put in process, a new factor enters and takes over. A trip, a safari, an exploration, is an entity, different from other journeys. It has personality, temperament, individuality, uniqueness. A journey is a person in itself; no two are alike. And all the plans, safeguards, policing, and coercion are fruitless. We find after years of struggle that we do not take a trip; a trip takes us.”  – John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley

I’m barely getting through my days right now without the aid of antiquated gangsta rap and John. I’m in the hustling trenches. Wake up. Write, then market. Phone call, email, phone call, email, wait, wait, email telling you to wait, phone call, rinse, repeat. Support our mission! Give us money! Yes, you’ll get pro photo assets. Yes, we’ll shout you out. Yes, we work with the UN, yes, big media is going to cover it. Yes, we’ll rock your brand as long as you give a demonstrable, objective crap about the earth. We’re here. We’re epic, we’re leaving soon. Give us money.

This is my life for the next four weeks. It’s good, though: I believe in what I do. Perennially on the road, I’m fund hunting via iPhone (I once filled out a 12-page grant application on it). Red into the black, that’s my mission. Float the boat.

So, no reports this week from far flung locales. I’m at home doing the dirty work that makes this plastic trash studying in the ocean work possible. And I’m antsy. I can’t hunch over my computer saying “I need to do more yoga” one minute longer, reading about Sun Chips ditching their compostable bag because it’s just too noisy. Or Coburn, the small-minded bastard, not having an issue with shark finning. It’s crazymaking. Forget ethical integrity so we can snack quietly and enjoy a tipple of exotic broth.

November 1, I leave for Rio De Janeiro, Brazil to join my 5 Gyres team to prepare for our departure to Capetown, South Africa, aboard our trusty lady, The Sea Dragon, to study plastic pollution in yet another oceanic gyre. Then I’ll hang in South Africa doing events and presentations (and surfing) for the month of December. Next, it’s up the coast of Africa to Walvis Bay, Namibia, to an island named St. Helena, then to Montevideo, Uruguay. I’ll be “home” February 11, 2011.

The crew will consist of our usual suspects and we’re in the throes of selecting the fresh meat. Sailing across an ocean is no joke, and you need to vet your crew if you’re going to occupy a 72 by 15 foot space for 30 days straight. And our ship is a working vessel. No whiners or dilettantes allowed. We take journalists, artists, pro surfers, industry reps, students, teachers – if you come back and fight for the cause, then it’s worth you seeing something that very few people on earth even imagine exists: A plastic trash vortex in the middle of the ocean.

If you’re a plastic warrior and have some skills, talk to the Ed. at EcoSalon and I’ll get you on the ship. It’ll change your life. It did mine.

These are the areas we study. What you’re looking at here is a computer model of buoys that drifted in the ocean for 10 years, pinging their locations everyday. This is their path. The gyre, as we say, is the red parts. Some are more concentrated, some are more diffuse. All have an incredible amounts of plastic in them.

If you have an interest in this subject (which I so warmly refer to as our little marine disaster of incomprehensible scale), I’m going to be reporting via satellite on what we find “out there” in an area of the world’s ocean that has never been studied for plastic pollution a few times a week.

Stay tuned. And fight everyday. Even just a little.

The post F@$K tha Plastique, Goin’ Straight South Atlantic Bound appeared first on EcoSalon.