More Speed Less Plastic
One Ocean Foundation and Team Denmark SailGP together to fight marine pollution
More Speed Less Plastic is an environmental initiative that One Ocean Foundation has developed with Denmark SailGP Team presented by ROCKWOOL to fight ocean plastic pollution by rewarding Denmark SailGP Team athletes for doing what they do best – racing fast in their F50. The aim of this initiative is to raise awareness on ocean issues while at the same time having a concrete impact through the collection of plastic waste from marine and coastal areas.
It’s simple – for every 1km/hr of speed the Denmark SailGP Team clocks in each SailGP Season 3 event, we will remove 10 kilograms of plastic litter from our ocean.But that’s not all: One Ocean Foundation will also reward the top speed for all teams at each SailGP event, by removing plastic from our ocean on behalf of any SailGP team who is the fastest on water. The goal? To remove at least 8 tons of plastic waste from our ocean by the end of Season 3 in San Francisco (May 2023). This will make Denmark SailGP Team the world’s first plastic positive sports team.
Plastic is not inherently bad. It’s a cheap, light and versatile material that can ensure safety and drive accessibility to important goods like medical equipment.But single-use plastics – for example, many traditional water bottles, packaging and shopping bags – are causing a huge impact on our planet, despite being used on average for just 12 minutes. After use, less than 1% of this single-use plastic waste is recycled – and much of it ends up in our ocean.As a result, our ocean is drowning in plastic. More than 8 million tons of plastic find their way into our ocean every year – and it’s estimated that plastic makes up over 80 percent of ocean trash.
What’s more, every piece of plastic ever created still exists. Plastic takes decades, or even centuries, to degrade, and first breaks down into smaller, micro - and nano-plastic particles, invisible to the naked eye. These particles have a major impact on the biodiversity of our ocean, harming marine life, and can even find their way into our food chain.
One Ocean Foundation activates this initiative through partnerships in developing countries where most of the plastic waste that threatens the oceans originates from. Plastic Bank is one of the suppliers that help facilitate the clean-up of our ocean and shoreline areas, whilst creating a circular economy in some of the world’s developing countries. Thanks to collaborations with local partners, plastics are collected, traced, and re-entered into the production cycle, favoring the development of a circular economy.
The F50 catamaran is one of sailing’s fastest boats – and is capable of reaching speeds close to 100km/hr., by foiling above the water. The current speed record is 99.94km/hr and was set by France SailGP Team in September 2022.
At Denmark SailGP Team, we’ve taken steps to identify and reduce our single-use plastic footprint. Calculating and cutting our single-use plastic consumption is a great and necessary first step and is something that we can all do in our own lives.
It’s about behaviour change. We need to shift our relationship with single-use plastic – but until we live in a plastic-free society, it will be impossible to avoid some interactions with the material. Offsetting allows us to compensate day-to-day consumption which can’t be prevented. It’s a process in which we can help to protect and restore our ocean, whilst funding projects that drive sustainable development and circular economy in communities around the global SailGP circuit.
Denmark SailGP Team, led by Nicolai Sehested, has been competing in SailGP since 2020. The team features a mixed, young squad of athletes including Olympic champions, world championship winners and roundthe- world racers. And as Danish sailors, sustainability is in our DNA. We’re passionate about our ocean and that’s why we’re working with One Ocean Foundation to help raise awareness around the state of our seas, and highlight ways in which we can protect and restore them. Through the SailGP Impact League, we are able to do this in a competitive way – and we are one of the leading teams in the ranking, having won two events and taken a podium spot in 2022.
Our next goal? Become the first carbon and plastic positive team in sport.
