The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is a silent yet powerful reminder that human wastefulness is killing our planet. Swirling midway between California and Hawaii, this vortex of ocean pollution has been growing bigger every year, while the discarded plastic that comprises it slowly breaks down into microscopic death pills for fish and birds.
Looking at a picture of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch gives one the urge to fashion a huge pool skimmer, hire a boat, and lift all that trash right out of the ocean. Apparently it’s not that easy, and even if you could skim it all out, there’s no way to keep another patch from forming. That’s why a team of Serbian architects devices a series of underwater skyscrapers that could be placed in the gyre, ready to collect all the trash and convert it into energy.