In June 2016, the port of Saint-Florent received a visit from Peter Ceglinski, who came from Australia to present his «floating bin» concept, «The Seabin Project».www.seabinproject.com/), conceived with his surfer friend Andrew Turton.

It took them 4 years to develop the «Seabin», a submersible bin that catches all types of floating waste, but also soon, chemical pollutants like hydrocarbons or detergent products.

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Ideally, this bin should be placed on the surface of still water, such as can be found in ports, marinas or lakes. Currents will naturally bring pollutants closer to the bin, drawing them in as they pass nearby.

A water pump, with low power consumption (500 Watts), placed on the quay, draws water from the top of the bin. The water passes through the pump before being discharged purified back into the sea. A hydrocarbon separator is also planned.

A «Seabin» can single-handedly intercept bottles, plastic bags, plastic cutlery, and cigarette butts (two of the most commonly collected wastes each year)... but also microplastic pellets as small as 2 millimetres in diameter, responsible for ecological disasters, particularly in the Antarctic Ocean. Furthermore, the device allows for the separation of oily materials (such as oil or detergent) from water, to purify it.

Even though this system is small and consumes little power, its advantage is that it can operate 24/7, every day of the year. Inside the «Seabin» bin is a natural fibre bag where waste is collected. When the bag is full, it simply needs to be emptied to be reused, after sorting the collected waste.

After securing the necessary funding, notably through Poralu Marine's investment, Andrew and Peter were able to finalise their «Seabins» and in May 2018, we were able to install these revolutionary bins in our harbour.
We are very proud to be the first port in Corsica to have installed this system, and we hope that others will follow us quickly!