Ocean cleaning machine: Australian surfers quit jobs, invent Seabin to clean up ocean - TomoNews

PERTH, AUSTRALIA —Two Australia surfers are gaining the attention from investors around the world for their invention of a device that helps clean the ocean, according to Australia’s ABC News. ABC News reports that Andrew Turton and Pete Ceglinski, who are best friends, became frustrated over the amount of trash that was floating in the ocean. They decided to quit their jobs to come up with a sustainable solution to the problem of ocean pollution, and invented the Seabin. The Seabin is an automated rubbish bin designed to be mounted on marina docks to help clean the water. According to the duo’s company website, the Seabin, which is built from recycled materials, is mounted to a dock and connected to water pump that is powered by an source on the shore. The pump pulls water through the Seabin, thus bringing all the floating rubbish and debris in the water into a natural fibre bag inside the device before water is pumped back out. The floating debris is captured inside the Seabin, and water flows out through the bottom of the bin and pulled up into the pump on the dock. There is also an option to attach an oil and water separating device to the water pump to clean the water before it is returned to the ocean. "It essentially works as a similar concept to a skimmer box from your pool filter. But it's designed on a scale to work and essentially attract all that rubbish within a location within a marine harbour," said Seabin spokesperson Richard Talmage, as quoted by ABC News. ABC News reports that the duo designed a prototype of the bin in Perth before taking it to market in Mallorca in Spain, a marina capital of Europe. A crowdfunding effort has already raised $50,000 for commercial production of the Seabin, and a video of the device has attracted more than 10 million hits online.