From July 10 to 15, the members of the Unified Volunteer Center of the Murmansk Region and the participants in the Clean Arctic project helped the researchers of the General Ecology and Hydrobiology Department of the Faculty of Biology of Moscow State University named after M. V. Lomonosov to conduct research on the waste accumulated on the southern coast of the Barents Sea. The biologists have already collected data on the pollution of the coast of the Kola Peninsula with plastic debris and identified the areas requiring thorough attention. In the Dalniye Zelentsy area in the Murmansk Region, 30 volunteers helped the scientists in collecting, removing and sorting the coastal garbage so that it could be studied in future. Some rescue divers helped in the work to assess the pollution of bottom sediments with plastic debris and take samples for further microbiological study.
“The expedition to the Dalniye Zelentsy is the second project implemented by the Unified Volunteer Center, it is the result of the Center’s cooperation with the scientific community and the Clean Arctic. At first, we studied the quality of some water of springs in the Murmansk Region together with the researchers of the Kola Science Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences, and we are waiting for the results of these laboratory studies by the end of summer. The new project was launched in collaboration with the biologists of the Moscow State University. This time, the volunteers will contribute to a comprehensive study of pollution in the western part of the Russian Arctic due to plastic debris. The researchers have been working in our region for the whole month, and our volunteers join them in the period of the most intensive work,” said Evgenia Chibis, Head of the Unified Volunteer Center of the Murmansk Region.
The results obtained by the expedition will be used as the basis for a large-scale study aimed at developing a universal environmentally friendly solution for the disposal of many types of coastal plastic debris. According to the preliminary estimates, up to 15% of the total amount of the plastic waste collected on the Barents Sea coast can be used for recycling.
It is well known that today, the problem of non-recyclable waste and the search for local solutions for their most environmentally friendly recycling are extremely relevant.
“Intellectual potential should be used to develop a way of environmentally friendly waste disposal,” notes Olesya Ilyina, an employee of the General Ecology and Hydrobiology Department of the Faculty of Biology of the Moscow State University, Head of the SevMorSubbotnik expedition cleanup project. “In Russia, such solutions are in great demand, so, they should be developed, tested and brought to an industrial scale. Moreover, these technologies must be adapted to the processing of small volumes of waste that cannot be recycled.”
This opinion is shared by the federal headquarters of the Clean Arctic project.
“This is a very important work that the researchers are doing together with volunteers. The Clean Arctic project supports such initiatives because it is not enough just to collect garbage. It is important to recycle it, to find new ways of waste disposal. If this method is found with our participation, we will know that we have become one step closer on the way to the clean Arctic, and therefore, the whole planet will be cleaner,” Andrey Nagibin, a member of the Clean Arctic federal headquarters, emphasized.
The Unified Volunteer Center of the Murmansk Region unites volunteer organizations in order to consolidate the efforts of volunteer communities, share their experience and support the initiatives of people who want to help others. One of the important areas of the Center’s work is the environmental volunteering. Since September 2021, several projects have been implemented and campaigns have been carried out together with the Clean Arctic federal project to clean up the Arctic coasts and the sites near the well-springs.
The Clean Arctic project is a large-scale one to clean up the Arctic area from waste accumulated since the Soviet times. The idea was originally conceived by Dmitry Lobusov, Captain of the ‘50 Years of Victory’ nuclear icebreaker, and Gennady Antokhin, Soviet and Russian icebreaker captain, Hero of Labour of the Russian Federation.
The Clean Arctic project has become a platform that brings together public and volunteer organizations, researchers, heads of various regions, and business community. The project partners are MMC Norilsk Nickel, PhosAgro, and the Russian Railways.
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