Don’t expect to demurely sip a cocktail from a straw within Seattle's city limits. As of July 1, plastic straws and eating utensils are banned. Now diners will either have to pack their own or just put their mouth on the glass and drink the old-fashioned way.
Single-use disposable plastic bags are causing more harm than good for the environment. Even though they are convenient to carry groceries, they are anything but convenient for the planet. When improperly disposed of, a plastic bag can easily be carried by the wind to our oceans. Due to their lightweight design, even if it was thrown out far from water, it can still end up in the sea.
The University of North Carolina at Wilmington’s newly formed chapter of UNCW NAMEPA helped celebrate World Ocean Day at a special event on campus June 8th. UNCW NAMEPA’s leadership participated in the event to help educate families in the community. We had a great time with the families who came to this special event! We were able to teach people of all ages how long certain types of trash remain in the ocean by having them play a matching game thanks to supplies provided by NAMEPA and Marine Quest.
Did you know that NAMEPA offers an immersive internship program for high school and college students to Save Our Seas? Check out what our spring interns from high schools in Connecticut said about their experience!
In June of 2018, NAMEPA traveled to Washington DC to attend Capitol Hill Ocean Week, affectionately known as CHOW. CHOW is a 3 day conference where scientists, politicians, educators, entrepreneurs, and innovators gather together to discuss the latest in marine research and methods for protecting our oceans.
Celebrating 12 years of existence, the Steering Committee of INTERMEPA, the International Marine Environment Protection Association, convened in Athens yesterday, 7 June, on the occasion of Posidonia 2018. Present Members of the Committee were Warwick Norman, Chairman of AUSMEPA, George Tsavliris, Chairman of CYMEPA, Dr. George Gratsos and Capt. Dimitris Mitsatsos, Chairman and Director General of HELMEPA respectively, Joseph Hughes and Carleen Lyden-Walker, Chairman and Executive Director of NAMEPA respectively and Sadan Kaptanoglu, Chairperson of TURMEPA. HELMEPA’s BoD Treasurer Nicolas Bafaloukos and Legal Advisor Nicolas Gerassimou together with Christiana Prekezes, Executive Coordinator and Costas Triantafillou, Assistant Executive Coordinator, were also in attendance.
Royal Caribbean will be hitting the waves — and leaving plastic straws behind. The cruise line has pledged to eliminate plastic straws by the end of 2018.
In May 2018 NAMEPA attended the Volvo Ocean Race (VOR), a sailing race around the world bringing together global cultures which is held every three years.
After a rainy weekend in Syracuse, NY it was finally warm and sunny on Monday (4/30). Making it the perfect day to clean up the surrounding woods and shorelines of a local lake, Green Lakes, near the Syracuse University campus.…
On 03 March, three members of Division 9, braved a brisk and windy but sunny morning to pick up trash and litter along a segment of shoreline at the New Hope Overlook ramps on Jordan Lake. Perry Taylor, 09-11, Sankey Blanton, 09-08, and Jim Frei, 09-11 spent about 90 minutes tromping through shrubs, woods, riprap, and briers retrieving trash that accumulates along the shoreline. With high winds blowing directly into the cove, a big load of trash was expected, but a lot less was found. This same segment of shoreline was picked over last November when the lake level was down four feet, so a lot of trash had already been removed. Only three bags were collected during this event. We have observed that less trash is accumulating along this shoreline over the past several years. However, we are still seeing too much styrofoam. The Division 9 segment does not get a lot of bank fishermen, so we don’t see much abandoned fishing line or plastic bait cups.
Strange to think that a little straw can be threatening. . .