Boyan Slat Quotes

One of my big pet peeves is single-use plastic bags. I think it's one of the stupidest ideas in the world.

It's funny: being green to me was ingrained because my parents were always trying to save money, save water, turn off the lights, or arrange a carpool. I don't think my parents even know what it means to be green, but they were.

Thanks to David Attenborough and 'Blue Planet 2,' we've become aware of the damage to our oceans from plastic pollution. We now know to use textile shopping bags instead of plastic, reuse coffee-cups and refuse polystyrene ones, and avoid plastic straws when ordering a drink at the bar.

I watched a documentary called 'Plastic Oceans' on Netflix, and it was an eye-opener for me.

Plastic doesn't have to be ocean plastic pollution.

I was brought up to reuse things.

If you're not buying recycled products, you're not really recycling.

Everyone is slowly catching on to this one - and I know everyone says this - but we need to make a little more effort with the environment. Everyone says they turn off their lights, but do they really?

Even clingfilm - if it's gone over a salad bowl, take it off, use it again. I wash out carrier bags; I save brown paper from parcels. I save string; I save ribbons. I separate all my bits and pieces.

When we unwrap presents, I tend to sit there with a bin liner trying to collect up the wrapping paper and thinking about which pieces I can reuse and which I will recycle.

It makes a big difference to recycle. It makes a big difference to use recycled products. It makes a big difference to reuse things, to not use the paper cup - and each time you do, that's a victory.

There aren't many things that are universally cool, and it's cool not to litter. I'd never do it.

Nothing is wasted.

Not everything needs to be recycled.

Years ago, we all talked about recycling and not dumping things down your drain and all of that, but talking doesn't help much. Basically, it's going to have to be legislation because the impact is so huge and diversified.

We can no longer throw our waste away because there is no away.

When I learned about this tragedy that's happening in Midway - you know, these birds whose stomachs are filled with handfuls of our waste - I just felt drawn there magnetically.

To truly rid the oceans of plastic, what we need to do is two things: One, we need to clean up the legacy pollution, the stuff that has been accumulating for decades and doesn't go away by itself. But, two, we need to close the tap, which means preventing more plastic from reaching the oceans in the first place.

We have to be responsible towards the environment when we celebrate our festivals.

When I was a little kid - and I don't know why - I was obsessed with littering. I'd yell at people in their cars if I saw someone throw paper or a cup out of their window.

There is no 'recycle too much.' That's an oxymoron.

There's a recycling mentality about my work.

Reusing and recycling our materials is the most important thing we can do.

Benjamin Franklin said there were only two things certain in life: death and taxes. But I'd like to add a third certainty: trash. And while some in this room might want to discuss reducing taxes, I want to talk about reducing trash.

Thanks to my mother, not a single cardboard box has found its way back into society. We receive gifts in boxes from stores that went out of business twenty years ago.