'Manta' boat takes on world's ocean trash

(SOUNDBITE) (French) FRANCO-SWISS SKIPPER AND FOUNDER AND CHAIRMAN OF "THE SEACLEANERS" NGO, YVAN BOURGNON, SAYING: ''With three or four hundred of those boats you could collect a third of the world's pollution.''

This boat recycles ocean trash on board

By 2024 it could turn into a working prototype

and help clean up debris polluting the world’s seas

(SOUNDBITE) (French) FRANCO-SWISS SKIPPER AND FOUNDER AND CHAIRMAN OF "THE SEACLEANERS" NGO, YVAN BOURGNON, SAYING:"The Manta is a sea giant which is 56 meters long, which can collect over a width of 46 meters and which weighs close to 2 thousand tonnes. It will be able to deploy 250 days a year to collect five to ten thousand tonnes of plastic a year, that's between one and two tonnes of waste every hour so these numbers are quite something. With three or four hundred of those boats you could collect a third of the world's pollution. It's not enough but it's by multiplying these kind of initiatives, smaller boats and other solutions, that we'll be able to eradicate a part of the problem."

It’s also 70% self-sufficient in terms of energy

Melting down plastic on board produces gas

which drives a turbine and generates electricity