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Golf Ball Cleanup

Keeping ocean clean is essential because people need air food and water for drinking

eating and breathing. Sea gives at least a 6th of the animal protein from individuals to eat. Living

seas reduce climate change impacts and ingest carbon dioxide from the air .it is also the source of

giving us clean water. Alex Weber was swimming with her father in the sea off pebble beach,

California. She noticed something strange: a lot of golf balls. She was alarmed by the trash. She

collected those balls with her father and friends. There were thousands of golf balls wandering

there.

Alex was offended. Alex decided to haul them up. She began a Sisyphean task that went

on for months: Alex and her father would haul hundreds of pounds of them up. Alex took what

Alex and her father collected back home. Then Alex heard about a scientist, and Matt Savoca

works in a Stanford University who studied the plastic waste in the sea. Alex emailed him, and

Savoca came to look at her collection. Fifty thousand golf balls, just sitting in the garage

mentioned by Alex. He was impressed and joined the Alex clean up mission. Alex also writes a

scientific paper Regards to water pollution, which harms the sea creature.

There are many sharks in the water there, but Matt says that wasn't the real threat. It was

not the biggest concern that they were out there, Matt says we wear splashing voices from water,

and we'd turn upward on the hill. There'd be golf balls flying in off the course directly into the

sea where we were doing the collection. Despite the aerial barrage, they kept at it, says Matt.
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Whenever they had the right conditions, they were able to pull out between, like, 500 to 5,000

golf balls as mentioned by the Alex.

They found more than 50,000 golf balls within a span of two years. This was the

contribution of five golf courses which were there. Two along the coastline, and three up the

Carmel River — those golf balls rolled underwater down the river to the ocean. In the journal

Marine Pollution Bulletin, Alex and her teammates noted that golf balls are covered with a thin

polyurethane shell that degrades over time. The golf balls also contained zinc intensifies that are

harmful. Matt points out that the surf and currents act like a rock grinder and break down the golf

balls.

According to the Savoca Matt, chemicals from 50,000 or golf balls will have just a little

impact on the sea, Matt they do degrade into Micro plastic particles that marine creatures could

eat. The Alex team also notes that there are lots of coastal golf courses around the world, so this

may go beyond the California. Alex now 18 years old, and a published author in a scientific

journal plans to apply to university to study marine science. In a short time, Alex is still

collecting and keeping up her website. Alex says it is too bad the golf balls sink. If they floated,

people would be shocked and outraged.