Marc Ward

Seaside, Oregon, United States

Saving sea turtles from extinction.

I have worked for 13 years in the communities surrounding Punta Pargos, Costa Rica to protect marine turtles and change the imbedded cultural practice of poaching every single marine turtle egg -- and some turtles. This has led to the release of over 100,000 endangered marine turtle hatchlings over the last 11 years. I have created Jobs -- for poor local people who where once poaching the beaches and reef daily, our work has removed a swath of this illegal element from the local dynamic. Also creating cottage industries for the underprivleged children living in these poor rural communities that the endangered turtles nest in. I have also operated a reef revitalization program for ten years at Lagartillo Reef that has revitalized the fishing industry of the Punta Pargos area and made the reef much safer for the many foraging Marine Turtles,Lobster,Fish and Cambote that are vital to the health and prosperity of the villages that come there for livelyhoods. The work we have done for the last four years in Oregon is monumental. I initiated research on imbedded marine micro plastics in Oregon Beaches that was potentially exposing thousands of children to organic micro pollutants and legacy contaminants like PCBs in high density marine plastic sinks. This work has led to a solution for removing marine micro plastics down to micro meter size particles that are packed with over one million times normal background levels of PCBs, motabulated DDT ( DDD,DDE) and a wide asortment of other carcinogenic contaminants. The papers I co-authored with Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology ( TUAT) on that subject were key to identifying the dangers posed by these marine micro plastics, and the need to monitor and remove them from the system. Oue beach survey work has set methodology for guaging the density of these sinks and also approximating the Persistant Organic Pollutants in each square meter of our Oregon Beaches, many of which are State Parks where thousands of children play in the sand all summer. We have moved mountians with little or nothing to work with, we have set a course for remediation of the pristine Oregon beaches. I have formed alliances for STF with Northwestern University,Chicago -- Tokyo University, Japan, Guelph University,Canada, Northwestern College of Art,Portland,Oregon,STRP, California, Pretoma,Costa Rica, Australian Seabird Rescue,Ballina Australia, Rachel Carson School of Environmental Science,Clatsop Community College,Oregon -- creating a large network of researchers and environmentalists working on marine plastic debris and conservation issues. I have invented a device that removes marine micro plastics from the sand using a static charged screen filtration system able to remove contaminated micro plastics down to less that 100 micro meters in size. And a device that can absord Persistant Organic Pollutants from sediment passively and perpetually using no energy.

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