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A Bag A Day in Vilamoura. Read more about our discoveries a mission to leave our playground cleaner than we found it.

VILAMOURA


During ZB Racing’s winter training in Vilamoura, Portugal they have made it their mission to clean one bag of plastic per day. About 1,800 Liters of plastic could be collected from the shoreline and boat park, ensuring proper disposing for the litter.

We have separated the CleanUps in three categories. The shoreline, the boat park and the river. We have discovered hotspots, clusters and developed ways to tackle polluters. Most of the pollution discovered on the coast was coming from the fishing industry, with single use plastic on the second place. In the boat park the main polluters are the sailors themselves, which was hard to see for us. High performance sailing means each and every part of the boat must always function and be tuned to the maximum. Therefore the materials are often renewed and the old material is often left behind. The majority of pollution we found was bits of rope, tape and screws followed by single us plastic from food and drinks. On our CleanUps on the river we primarily discovered single use plastic bags and wrapping of food and drinks.

On this regard we want to point out that our mission during our CleanUps is not solely cleaning the environment but tackling the pollution as a whole. Discovering main polluters and pollution types helps analyse how to solve the problem. For the future we have already installed one solution, organising boat park CleanUps to collectively prevent the plastic from getting into the sea.

For the broader future it has become our mission to develop alternative solutions to single use plastic in sailing and other industries and help prevent the industries like the fishing industry from polluting our playground.

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Reusing existing recourses has become one of the most important factors of a sustainable future. With the initiativ wanted sails, we have made it our mission to upcycle sails to create accessories and our famous CleanUp bag

Upcycling old sails to make reusable accessories and bags has been done hundreds of times before, but making reusable CleanUp bags from old sails and boat equipment is something new. During our A Bag A Day cleanups in Vilamoura we have noticed that collecting plastic often does not go around using plastic to collect the trash in. Unhappy with the unnecessary pollution many have made because of this, we started drafting ideas and came to the conclusion that we could upcycle old sails. Old sails are firstly available to us and familiar because we come from sailing ourselves. Second of all they are made of one of the most durable materials, made to withstand the strongest forces of nature, wind and water. Often sails end up in landfill or end up just lying around after their active time has come to an end. We want to make a change to this and give them a new life with our initiative Wanted Sails.

Help us recycle old sails and purchase your own CleanUp bag or accessory in our shop. Together we can tackle pollution, make the world a better place and ensure a future to our sport and humanity.

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Educating people, especially childre, can be essential for making a change. It all start with the individual and collectively we can make a change. Find out how we’re partnering up with Nelson-Mandela School Berlin.

Climate education is lacking all around, but can be counted to be the most successful strategy to tackle pollution. It all begins with the consumer and his or her decision how to use their capita. Industries build up markets around their interests and if one can influence consumers to shop more sustainably, the industry will follow.

We have partnered up with the Nelson Mandela School in Berlin to educate children of all ages on ocean pollution and sustainable solutions to the problem including our own ones. We believe showing them alternatives and our self as an example of a solution helps them to understand how to react and find solutions themselves.

In the future we want to continue to build the maker space at the school and are working on a project where we recycle plastic to make 3d printer string and create new objects from it using the 3d printers in school. We want to teach that there are always solutions to existing problems and help develop solutions together, teaching the very valuable lesson of problem solving that one normally does not learn.

Together we are creating future leaders, people who care and people who understand the world, its needs and oportunities.

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Making sailing events more sustainable is vital for the future of our sport. We have partnered up with the BYC and the Sailing Championsleague to ensure that we work on sustainability together. Find out how we did it.

Sustainable sailing events are the future of our sport. Together with the Sailing Championsleague and the Berliner Yacht-Club we have partnered up to make events more sustainable. We have developed green solutions to many problems such as healthy food, no single use plastic, water refill stations etc. Furthermore we have implemented a trash deposit system and most importantly have put a lot of effort in inspiring the sailors themselves to live and sail more sustainably.

The top three teams were gifted a 45L CleanUp bag, inspiring them to clean their surrounding wherever they are and spreading the message further. We look forward to work together with many events to make our sport carbon neutral and inspire others to follow.

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