A 'Bubble Barrier' is Trapping Plastic Waste Before It Can Get Into the Sea (cnn.com) 28
larryjoe writes: A curtain of bubbles in Amsterdam's Westerdok canal filters 86% of trash floating down the canal. The bubbles come from a pipe at the bottom of the canal connected to an air compressor. Holes in the pipe allow the bubbles to float to the water surface, forming a water curtain that pushes trash to the water surface. The curtain is positioned in a skewed orientation to allow the downstream water flow to channel the trash to a catchment system. This novel system catches many types of trash without a physical barrier that impedes vehicles or wildlife. The catchment system only keeps trash that is at least 10mm in size to allow small wildlife to escape. This filtering system is being trialed by a small startup.
Thank YOU (Score:3)
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"Now how about for the Ganges? (Can it filter out corpses too?)"
They have installed giant tortoises to eat the bodies years ago, as you can imagine, they are doing well.
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I think you were going for Funny.
Don't give up your day job yet.
Just add a Mr Trash Wheel and you're done (Score:3)
Between the bubble curtain and a Mr Trash Wheel they should capture everything
https://www.mrtrashwheel.com/ [mrtrashwheel.com]
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This is a nice solution. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Bubble curtains have a few uses [sierrasun.com]
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> Bubble curtains have a few uses
Add in some neon lights and the fish can pretend they're in a cheesey 90s era night club.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Re: This is a nice solution. (Score:2)
Not only does it get junk out of the water, aerating the water is good for the wildlife.
And possibly a little too good for some local underwater flora.
The additional aeration/oxygenation could seriously alter (and maybe not for the better) the local underwater ecosystem.
I used to live near Three Mile Island. After only a few years of operation, the warmer water flowing out of the cooling towers had raised the local water temp of the Susquehanna River about 0.5 deg. F. This caused enough of an algae overgrowth (IIRC) that it was threatening some of the local aquatic species.
Jus' sayin'...
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Blue-green algae growth consumes so much oxygen that fish asphyxiate and can cause large fish kills. You can see there is not enough oxygen in the water when fish surface and gulp at the air. Aeration helps.
It is of course eutrophication (excess nutrients) causing the algal problem overall, this needs to be addressed separately.
BTW, the algae make excellent fertiliser, citrus especially. Just pull it out of the water and spread around the base of the plant (without touching the trunk just to be safe). He
Also... (Score:1)
I've seen this in a canal in London. There it's used to stop duckweed spreading.
Wouldn't This Affect The Fish? (Score:4, Interesting)
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whales regularly use bubble nets to herd fish, I can't imagine this doesn't stop the fish from traveling through.
Lack of capability to imagine doesn't mean it is not what happens -- not all "bubbles curtains" will have the exact same properties; for sure the frequency, sizing, spacing, and how much air volume they are pumping will be factors. Ultimately that is a design problem for their system involving research and engineering to ensure fish will not in practice get stuck and disrupted because of the tr
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This doesn't look anywhere near as strong as the bubble curtains used to herd fish.
Mind you we could always install a fish doorbell to temporarily stop the curtain so they can swim through: https://visdeurbel.nl/about-th... [visdeurbel.nl]
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46% of ocean plastic pollution is old fishing nets (Score:5, Interesting)
If you want to stop half the plastic polluting the oceans, stop buying anything caught with a fishing net:
https://www.seashepherdglobal.... [seashepherdglobal.org]
https://www.theguardian.com/en... [theguardian.com]
Re:46% of ocean plastic pollution is old fishing n (Score:5, Funny)
[Sigh] Back to dynamite fishing.
mandatory reference for us old folk (Score:2)
I need to re-binge watch "The Prisoner" and the attack bubble, Rover [youtube.com]
Energy Inputs? (Score:1)
Cool idea. Wish there were some details about airflow or compressor energy inputs (which are sure to be from renawables, but still). Their website avoids answering that frequently asked question... https://thegreatbubblebarrier.... [thegreatbu...arrier.com]
So... (Score:2)
So those environmentally glorious Nederlanders are big slobs who throw their crap into the canals? Or is just from American tourists?