High-Level Project Summary
Today, the pollution of our seas by plastic waste poses a serious threat to both nature and living things. That's why we designed a game system that will both entertain and raise awareness in order to improve this problem. We have created an aircraft and a waste collection device connected to this game system.
Link to Project "Demo"
Link to Final Project
Detailed Project Description
Today, the deterioration of the ecological balance is an important problem due to the density of wastes in the seas. According to data from the World Economic Forum, an average of 8 million tons of plastic ends up in ocean waters every year. The international environmental protection organization Greenpeace applied for the help of 10 thousand volunteers from 42 countries within the scope of the "Get Rid of Plastic" campaign to control the plastic pollution in the seas. After 9 months of investigations, more than 187,000 pieces of plastic were collected in 239 sea cleaning operations. According to the figures of Bergmann and his colleagues, the amount of garbage, which was 5 thousand per kilometer in 2011, increased by 2 thousand in 2014. Fifty years ago, global annual plastic production was under 50 million tons; Production in 2015 was approximately 450 million tons. Between 5 and 14 million tons of plastic reaches the ocean each year, and that only comes from coastal areas. Around the world, 70% of construction waste sinks into the ocean ecosystem, 15% swims and 15% ends up on our beaches. According to the Nature Conservation Foundation (WWF) Mediterranean Plastics Report, 95% of the waste in the Mediterranean is plastic. 134 species of sea creatures living in the Mediterranean eat plastic waste. There are 1.25 million plastic pieces smaller than 5 millimeters per square kilometer in the Mediterranean. Since the vast majority of plastic waste is not biodegradable, plastics released into the environment stay there for hundreds or even thousands of years. Cigarette butts from plastic products remain undissolved in the sea for 5 years. This period is 20 years for a plastic bag, 50 years for a plastic cup, and 600 years for a fishing line. 65% of the plastic waste that causes the most harm to animals is the fishing line that is released into the sea. Stating that only 4 percent of the oceans are under protection and the situation is getting worse day by day, Perez said, "I have been diving for more than 20 years and I am seeing less and less fish every day." Artificial intelligence system was used to achieve this goal and the details of the project are as follows:
Aircraft, which proceeds in the logic of drones and has the image of a bird, will collect chemical wastes in the sea with its detection and monitoring software. With the help of the net that will come out of its body during waste collection, it will collect wastes up to 20 kg and take them to the separation mechanism in the sea. The reason why the aircraft is in the shape of a bird is designed so that flying creatures do not see the aircraft as a threat to themselves. During the flight, the aircraft will detect the living things around it and will not harm any living thing. At the same time, solar energy, which is one of the renewable energy sources, will be used in order not to harm the nature during the operation of the aircraft.
The process of separating heavy metals and microplastics from water will begin when the aircraft brings the chemical wastes collected with the help of the net to the separation device. The chemical waste separation device consists of 3 parts. The materials arriving by the aircraft will be transferred from the area where the solid wastes are collected, which is the number one part of the mechanism, to the area number two. In zone number two, heavy metals and microplastics will be separated from the water. The separated materials will be ready for the waste ships to receive with the replaceable chamber technology. In order not to harm the nature in the use of this device, wave blades, which are a renewable energy source, were used with the help of zone 3. The energy generation system of the wave blades is achieved by the movements and wave pressure in the sea. Waste collector ships will be used to transport the separated chemical wastes to land for recycling. Ships will take the replaceable hopper number 2 with the help of the drawbar and replace it with a new hopper.
In order to preserve the traceability and transparency of these transactions, an application open to the public will be designed. This app, which can be downloaded to phones, will be connected to the aircraft and people will be closely involved in the whole process. It is aimed to execute this with a game system. In the game system, people will be able to use aircraft and deliver the waste to the waste sorting device. As the game system collects waste, it will progress in the form of leveling up. As the leveling takes place, the time it takes for people to use the aircraft will increase. At the same time, the aircraft will have a camera system that sees certain depths of the sea, and each camera will see different depths. As you level up, people will have the opportunity to see deeper parts. At the same time, in order to make the application educational and instructive, they will be able to get information about the names and characteristics of sea creatures if they wish. In practice, there will be sign language for the hearing impaired and audio narration for the visually impaired. In this way, we will provide people with social responsibility awareness with the game.
Space Agency Data
WWF, Akdeniz Plastik Raporu'nu yayımladı: Akdeniz'e en çok plastik Türkiye'den | WWF
Toxicological Threats of Plastic | US EPA
Unwelcome enrichment in the Arctic | Earthdata (nasa.gov)
While developing our project, we took care to benefit from national resources. After determining the purpose of our project, we frequently used numerical data to present the reason why we serve this purpose with all its transparency. We researched the accuracy of the data and frequently included NASA's sources.
Hackathon Journey
We once again understood the harm of plastic waste thrown into the sea to the environment and living things during the project development process. Seeing this with numerical data and examining NASA's data led us to the idea that people should be made aware of this issue urgently. We were motivated by the idea of contributing to the idea of protecting nature and the sea and helping people to raise this awareness.
References
Tags
#sea #water #renewableenergysource #game #drone #ai #ml #plastic
Global Judging
This project has been submitted for consideration during the Judging process.