This Cornish company is helping to fight plastic pollution in our oceans

The global pandemic disrupted the world in unimaginable ways and while humans are on the road to recovery, the oceans are under threat.

Every single day more than 58 million single-use face masks are used and discarded within the UK alone and they have now become one of the biggest threats facing our oceans with an estimated 1.5billion of them having already entered our oceans.

Cornwall based company Waterhaul have launched several initiatives to help combat this persistent stream of PPE from reaching our oceans including their ‘Retask the Mask’ campaign which focusses on recycling single-use face masks, supplied by Treliske hospital in Cornwall, into litter pickers in a bid to inspire a global clean-up effort.

By using a specialist on-site machine that both melts recycled face masks and sterilises the material, Waterhaul then uses this material to create their recycled litter pickers.

“The aim of the retask the mask campaign is to turn the problem into the very solution. We need to intercept the plastic before it reaches our oceans or ends up in landfill, by working directly with the NHS we are creating a product designed to tackle the masks which are already present within the environment” said Harry Dennis, CEO at Waterhaul.

The ‘Retask the Mask’ campaign aims to inspire a global clean-up; encouraging people to try litter picking and experience its ‘do good, feel good’ wellbeing effect whilst tackling the new wave of plastic pollution created by Covid-19.

Waterhaul litter pickers were originally bought to life via a crowdfunding campaign which raised over £35,000 to help manufacturing be set up within the UK.

In late 2021 Waterhaul partnered with Cornwall Council and the Royal Cornwall Hospital Trust to send two litter pickers to every school within the county. This initiative is something Waterhaul are looking to expand upon throughout Devon and the rest of the country.