Several days in advance of last month’s annual “floatilla” off Waikiki Beach, a local nonprofit that had dedicated the previous six July Fourth holidays to cleanup at the trash-strewn scene pulled the plug on its participation.
Sustainable Coastlines Hawaii said despite its efforts — diverting an annual haul of about 500 pounds of debris generated at the get-together, and attempting to educate partygoers on proper trash disposal — it had not seen green-minded improvement. In an announcement tinged with frustration, Kahi Pacarro, the group’s executive director, said, “We can no longer encourage behavior that we don’t agree with by enabling it through our own actions.”
It’s possible that the group’s deliberate in-action help sound an environmental wake-up call of sorts.
This year’s crowd — an estimated at 500 to 600 people — was about half the size of that gathered in 2016 and 2017. And while hundreds bobbing in nearshore waters needed a hand getting back to the beach, none required emergency medical services. Last year, more than 20 people — many of them inebriated — needed medical treatment. What’s more, state officials reported minimal party-related ocean debris.
Pacarro said he suspects that because his group, along with state and federal agencies and the media, have spotlighted growing concerns about safety and pollution, “people that would have otherwise gone decided that they didn’t want to be part of the mess that the floatilla has become.” And those who did go apparently did a better job of having fun while acting responsibly than previous crowds.
An Oahu native, Pacarro and friends launched Sustainable Coastlines Hawaii in 2010, drawing on inspiration from Sustainable Coastlines in New Zealand, which got its start a few years earlier. “We are separate from a financial standpoint but we share the same ethos,” he said.
The Honolulu-based group has so far put together more than 90 cleanups, with a total of nearly 19,600 volunteers pitching in to clear more than 160 tons of marine debris. It has also shared its environmental message with nearly 27,000 children at schools and various events.
Question: How did New Zealand figure into Sustainable Coastlines Hawaii’s start?
Answer: While traveling around the world (2008-2010) … my girlfriend — my wife now — and I participated in a cleanup with Sustainable Coastlines in New Zealand (a charity organization that coordinates large-scale coastal cleanup events, education programs and riparian planting projects).
They took 300 of us out to a remote island off of Auckland via ferry. From there we cleaned for a few hours, collected data, and brought all the debris to the docks. After that we all went to a big field where we proceeded to party. … Like for real party. … But when we all woke up in the morning the place was clean because there was no waste created during the night. The festivities were plastic-free, and people were conscious about waste after picking it up for hours earlier in the day.
The event stuck with us — not from the raging party standpoint, but more from the fact that you could have fun while doing good for the planet. Upon returning home, I realized that Hawaii is at the epicenter of the plastic pollution problem. With pollution from around the Pacific Rim drifting here, Hawaii provides a global context of a local problem.
Q: Of Sustainable Coastlines Hawaii’s cleanups, which sites strike you as the top dirty-beach offenders?
A: Each island has a spot that is being most burdened by … over-consumption of plastic and cheap seafood. For Oahu that spot would be Kahuku. The remoteness and solitude you feel there is in stark contrast to the copious amount of debris burdening its shores. Much of it is coming in from abroad, with nearly 80 percent of it being from commercial fishing. … We can clean one day and two weeks later it will look like no one has cleaned in years.
The flow of trash is just getting worse and no Hawaiian island is immune from this problem. … The dirtiest beach I ever witnessed was in Papahanaumokuakea (Marine National Monument). Challenging logistics, such as sending (shipping) containers across the state, or even into the monument … have become standing operating procedure.
Q: In school and community presentations, your group stresses that consumer habits must change. How’s that raising-awareness effort going?
A: People are starting to realize that clean beaches start at home. We’ve reached almost 10,000 students every year for the past two years and are set to exceed that amount this year. Students go home and share what they’ve learned, and the results are exciting. … The local beaches that we visit … see a reduced impact from locals.
But the issue remains that the vast majority of debris washing ashore in Hawaii isn’t from here. So unless we can reach outside of Hawaii, we are doomed to be the location where your trash goes when you throw it “away.”
Q: A few years ago, amid a push to find a solution to the Ala Wai Canal’s trash woes, Sustainable Coastlines Hawaii was exploring the idea of a trash-skimming water wheel. Such an invention — powered by currents and solar panels — has collected more than 1.5 million pounds of trash in the last four years from Baltimore Harbor. Any progress here?
A: Permitting has been cumbersome and we’re now looking at technologies that require less permitting and cost. Options exist and we are actively investigating them. We won a grant to install a Seabin, which is a great way to gather data on what’s washing down the Ala Wai, but it catches just a fraction of the trash. (A floating Seabin sucks in surface water, with it passing through a catch bag. It’s then pumped out, leaving debris trapped in the bag.)
We want the feds, state and the city and county to get on board with our efforts. With leadership buy-in we can have a solution for our own local source of solid waste pollution entering the ocean. By installing a solution like the trash water wheel or other similar technology, we will lead by example and inspire others around the Pacific Rim to also implement similar strategies. When those other countries start implementing solutions closer to the source of the problem, we will see reduced impacts of plastic pollution on our coastlines.
Q: Changes in consumer habits can be spurred on by policy, of course. What are your thoughts on Oahu’s current plastic bags ban?
A: Our current plastic bag bans are the result of lobbyists watering down the bag ban that Hawaii really needs. It does not go far enough but that’s how politics goes.
Q: How about efforts to ban expanded polystyrene (EPS) foam containers in Hawaii?
A: This should have happened in this past legislative cycle. The fact that the bill was killed behind closed doors … shows the unfettered influence corporations have on our government. … As a culture, Hawaiian lifestyle was rooted in sustainability. Modern luau plates served on styrofoam (EPS) drives me crazy. EPS is made from oil. Styrene beads are expanded with steam in molds that make the packaging. Styrene is a known carcinogen. And when you put hot or oily foods into this styrofoam, styrene can leach into your food.
Q: Thoughts on the effort in the works to ban plastic straws in Hawaii?
A: Yeah, it’s cool, but I’m fearful of the shade it throws on the real reasons plastic pollution washes ashore in Hawaii. The primary reasons for our marine debris woes are unregulated commercial fishing and multinational corporations pushing a Western lifestyle on Third World countries without a municipal waste management infrastructure to deal with the trash that comes along with consumerism.
Q: In regards to seeing the nonprofit’s mission statement —“inspiring local communities to care for their coastlines” — realized, what are you most optimistic about?
A: Communities are taking initiative on their own … and realize that to truly sustain their coastlines it’s going to take proactive and reactive solutions. We’re seeing this happening across the state.
Q: What’s on the horizon for your group?
A: Launching an ocean plastics recycling program aimed at recycling plastic marine debris here in Hawaii. We want to create jobs and products that we can use here. For the past seven years we’ve been recycling marine debris, but it’s taken place on the mainland. This will change the game.
