Eye-Catching Designs Made from Recycled Plastic Bottles
The company sells a range of eco-friendly items like leggings, rash guards, and board shorts that are made using recycled post-consumer plastic bottles. There are currently 16 causes represented by distinct marine-life patterns, from whale shark research and invasive lionfish removal to sockeye salmon monitoring and abalone restoration.
One such organization is Get Inspired, a nonprofit that specializes in ocean restoration and environmental education. Get Inspired founder, marine biologist Nancy Caruso, says supporting on-the-ground efforts is one thing that sets Waterlust apart, like their apparel line that supports Get Inspired abalone restoration programs.
"All of us [conservation partners] are doing something," Caruso said. "We're not putting up exhibits and talking about it — although that is important — we're in the field."
Waterlust not only helps its conservation partners financially so they can continue their important work. It also helps them get the word out about what they're doing, whether that's through social media spotlights, photo and video projects, or the informative note card that comes with each piece of apparel.
"They're doing their part for sure, pushing the information out across all of their channels, and I think that's what makes them so interesting," Caruso said.
And then there are the clothes, which speak for themselves.
Advocate Apparel to Start Conversations About Conservation
Waterlust's concept of "advocate apparel" encourages people to see getting dressed every day as an opportunity to not only express their individuality and style, but also to advance the conversation around marine science. By infusing science into clothing, people can visually represent species and ecosystems in need of advocacy — something that, more often than not, leads to a teaching moment.
"When people wear Waterlust gear, it's just a matter of time before somebody asks them about the bright, funky designs," said Waterlust's CEO, Patrick Rynne. "That moment is incredibly special, because it creates an intimate opportunity for the wearer to share what they've learned with another."
The idea for the company came to Rynne when he was a Ph.D. student in marine science.
"I was surrounded by incredible people that were discovering fascinating things but noticed that often their work wasn't reaching the general public in creative and engaging ways," he said. "That seemed like a missed opportunity with big implications."
Waterlust initially focused on conventional media, like film and photography, to promote ocean science, but the team quickly realized engagement on social media didn't translate to action or even knowledge sharing offscreen.
Rynne also saw the "in one ear, out the other" issue in the classroom — if students didn't repeatedly engage with the topics they learned, they'd quickly forget them.
"We decided that if we truly wanted to achieve our goal of bringing science into people's lives and have it stick, it would need to be through a process that is frequently repeated, fun, and functional," Rynne said. "That's when we thought about clothing."
Support Marine Research and Sustainability in Style
To date, Waterlust has sold tens of thousands of pieces of apparel in over 100 countries, and the interactions its products have sparked have had clear implications for furthering science communication.
For Caruso alone, it's led to opportunities to share her abalone restoration methods with communities far and wide.
"It moves my small little world of what I'm doing here in Orange County, California, across the entire globe," she said. "That's one of the beautiful things about our partnership."
Check out all of the different eco-conscious apparel options available from Waterlust to help promote ocean conservation.
Melissa Smith is an avid writer, scuba diver, backpacker, and all-around outdoor enthusiast. She graduated from the University of Florida with degrees in journalism and sustainable studies. Before joining EcoWatch, Melissa worked as the managing editor of Scuba Diving magazine and the communications manager of The Ocean Agency, a non-profit that's featured in the Emmy award-winning documentary Chasing Coral.
The star freshman Congresswoman acknowledged that the ideas outlined in the non-binding resolution—such as providing "unprecedented levels of prosperity and economic security" for all citizens and "meeting 100 percent of the power demand in the United States through clean, renewable, and zero-emission energy sources"—are incredibly grand but absolutely necessary.
As Ocasio-Cortez said on
NPR's Morning Edition: "Even the solutions that we have considered big and bold are nowhere near the scale of the actual problem that climate change presents to us, to our country, to the world."
As the resolution points out, the United States has "historically been responsible for a disproportionate amount of greenhouse gas emissions" so it must take "a leading role" in reducing emissions through economic transformation.
This resolution outlines a plan to launch a WWII scale transformation of our economy, including a just transition f… https://t.co/CaT6lBz2ZU— Sunrise Movement 🌅 (@Sunrise Movement 🌅)1549544568.0
The overreaching goal of the Green New Deal is to entirely transition away from nuclear energy and fossil fuels. To do so, the proposal calls for a wide-ranging mobilization of the U.S. economy and creating jobs through infrastructure and industrial projects, such as zero-emission vehicle infrastructure and manufacturing; installing smart grids; updating or creating buildings that are energy efficient; expanding clean energy jobs (like solar, wind turbine, battery and storage manufacturing); cleaning existing hazardous waste sites; and restoration of damaged and threatened ecosystems.
Along the same lines, the Green New Deal includes a significant social justice component because it aims to create millions of family-supporting and union jobs and will help protect disadvantaged communities on the frontlines of pollution and climate change.
"This is really about providing justice for communities and just transitions for communities," Ocasio-Cortez explained on Morning Edition. "So really the heart of the Green New Deal is about social justice and it's about allowing and fighting for things like fully-funded pensions for coal miners in West Virginia, fighting for clean water in Flint, and fighting for the ability of indigenous peoples to take a leadership role in in where we're moving as a country."
So here's the big question—How do you pay for it? The FAQ section from Ocasio-Cortez's office puts it bluntly:
"The same way we paid for the New Deal, the 2008 bank bailout and extended quantitative easing programs. The same way we paid for World War II and all our current wars. The Federal Reserve can extend credit to power these projects and investments and new public banks can be created to extend credit. There is also space for the government to take an equity stake in projects to get a return on investment. At the end of the day, this is an investment in our economy that should grow our wealth as a nation, so the question isn't how will we pay for it, but what will we do with our new shared prosperity."
It's amazing to hear @AOC explain and fight for how we're going to pay for the Green New Deal, when asked about mas… https://t.co/5S3C2KChZA— Waleed Shahid (@Waleed Shahid)1549549785.0
The sweeping progressive proposal, of course, has its naysayers. As NPR's Danielle Kurtzleben reported:
Among Republicans—even those worried about climate change—the package, with its liberal economic ideas, will also likely be a nonstarter.
"Someone's going to have to prove to me how that can be accomplished because it looks to me like for the foreseeable future we're gonna be using a substantial amount of fossil fuels," said Rep. Francis Rooney, R-Fla., co-chair of the bipartisan Climate Solutions Caucus, speaking to NPR before the Green New Deal's text was released.
As for the proposal's passage, "That looks unlikely," Kurtzleben wrote.
But this part in Kurtzleben's report is key: "It's worth talking about because it already is a politically powerful idea among Democrats."
Nearly all of 2020 presidential candidates as well as potential contenders have already voiced support for the deal, including Elizabeth Warren, Cory Booker, Kamala Harris, Jeff Merkeley, Julian Castro, Kirsten Gillibrand, Bernie Sanders, Tulsi Gabbard and Jay Inslee, the FAQ noted.
That's not to mention the 45 House Reps and 330+ groups that backed the original resolution for a select committee on the Green New Deal.
Momentum for the Green New Deal has been growing ever since its was popularized by Ocasio-Cortez as well as the young climate activists of the Sunrise Movement who stormed then-presumed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office not long after the midterm elections.
"In 2018, young people put the Green New Deal on the national agenda," Varshini Prakash, founder and executive director of Sunrise Movement, said in a statement received by EcoWatch. "The historic support for this resolution, especially among 2020 contenders, shows how far the movement has shifted the political conversation. The Green New Deal is now a litmus test for progressive leadership in 2019."
So far, the resolution has already been cosponsored by nearly 70 members of Congress, according to the Sunrise Movement.
Here's my statement on today's Green New Deal Resolution: https://t.co/s0TD90cRjd https://t.co/pemCfA8tRA— Al Gore (@Al Gore)1549549215.0
Public opinion of the Green New Deal is strong. A Yale Program on Climate Change Communication survey of 966 registered voters showed that 92 percent of Democrats supported it, 64 percent of Republicans and 57 percent of conservative Republicans also thought it was a good idea.
This week, more than 100,000 petition signatures were delivered to Congressional offices in more than 100 events around the country, 350.org executive director May Boeve said in a press release emailed to EcoWatch.
"The Green New Deal is a critical opportunity to stand up to fossil fuel billionaires while kickstarting a just transition to renewable energy and creating millions of family-sustaining jobs," Boeve said in a statement. "With the window for action to prevent catastrophic climate change quickly closing, it's time for elected officials at all levels to support this visionary effort to secure a sustainable future."
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