GOES project funding required

Three projects.

1. Project GOES, global oceanic marine environmental survey, a citizen science project.
2. Project Indigenous, provision of clean drinking water and sanitation
3. Project Bocus del Toro, dolphin, and ecosystem centre

1. Project GOES

We are currently located in Bocas del Toro in Panama, having sailed here from Scotland over the last three years. On passage we ran the largest citizen science project to measure Marine plankton productivity, microplastic and partially combusted carbon pollution in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.

The first phase has been completed and a peer reviewed report published.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/364821580_Climate_Disruption_Caused_by_a_Decline_in_Marine_Biodiversity_and_Pollution

We will continue with the www.GOESfoundation.com project with our own resources, however we would like to increase the number of sailing vessels from the current number of 30 up to 100 then on to 200.  This will make the survey the worlds largest marine citizen science project for collecting oceanic data from all oceans.  This data that is currently not being collected by oceanographic ships because of the extreme high cost in sending ships into the middle of oceans.

To take the project, forward we would need to expand our existing base in Roslin Innovation Centre, Edinburgh University, and start funding PhD students to number crunch the data. 

Project GOES.  Budget is £1m, with ongoing funding of £250k per year for 5 years.

Carbon dioxide is responsible for around 20% of climate change, we have ignored nature and marine biodiversity, and indeed I gave the first ever talk at COP26 on the oceans last year.   It seems unbelievable but we are not addressing the fundamental reasons for climate change, or looking after the oceans.  The GOES project is about raising the awareness and collection of the data upon which informed decisions can be made. We currently have 3.5 million views of our Linkedin post every year on the subject.

GPES....COP 26 Presentation,  https://youtu.be/ORGxHr7GqrQ

2. Project, Indigenous people drinking water.

I spent the last 35 years developing www.DrydenAqua.com, we recycle 50% of the coloured glass bottles in Scotland and Switzerland to make AFM activated filter media.  AFM replaces sand in sand filter which is used to treated >99% of all our drinking water.   Dryden Aqua Ltd, is the largest glass recycling filter media manufacturer in the world.  I have now sold 100% of my shares in the company to focus on environmental projects.  I invented all of the products and was instrumental in providing over 1 million water treatment systems around the world.  AFM has the potential to eliminate all gastric parasitic infections in people, this equates to 60% of all disease in the world.

We (my wife and I)are working with geoveristy.org in Panama and helping them with drinking water and sanitation for the Guna and Embera people. The Embera people live in the rainforest in Chagres National Park and were the inspiration for James Cameron’s Avatar movie.  We have been to the real tree of life and the source of water and found it to be loaded with plastic. 

Please see our YouTube below.

https://youtu.be/dM-V5-kwyvk

Government providing them with a pipe at a cost of 60,000 usd to bring the water down 2.5km from the tree to the village, but as you will see from the images it is polluted with atmospheric drop out plastic, and Oxysoil containing ferric and aluminium.  We want to fix this water supply, with a proper drinking water system that will also provide sufficient water for sanitation.  The chief of the village Chief Zarco’s grandfather trained the Apollo 11 astronauts on jungle survival.  However, the people have now been ignored, 5% of the world’s population are indigenous people and they look after 80% of the ecosystem. Chief Zarco also represents the head of all indigenous people in Centra America, so a project with the Embera could have a wide reach.

Project Embera, drinking water estimate cost 100,000 usd

Note. My wife and partner Diane Duncan, she is ex Highlands and Islands development board, head of economic development, she wrote the first UK low carbon policy report over 20 years ago. Her work is only now being recognised.

3. Project Bocus.

We sailed to Bocas del Toro from Scotland, this was our end point that we had identified as a unique environment.

1. Tropical rainforest
2. Mangroves
3. Coral reefs
4. Seagrass
5. Genetically distinct colony of 80 dolphins
6. A unique archipelago that is endangered by tourism and pollution.

YouTube snapshot from the middle of the Atlantic Ocean after a storm; https://youtu.be/zoW-CoUPbps

Our plan is to purchase a plot of land shown in the following video.

https://youtu.be/Bv_vKPGziaI

We will pay 100% for the land from our own resources, however it is our intention to develop the site as an ecological centre for education of the public, indigenous people and as a research centre. We are working with Geoversity, I have been made Chair of Oceans and Water Innovation.

Vermont University will provide support via https://panacetacea.org/resources/

It is early days yet, but we will need additional resources to develop the site.  Tropical Rainforest, Mangroves, Seagrass, coral reefs, dolphins’ fish and coral, everything is connected as one integrated system, and it impacts on our weather.

We now know that even if we achieve net zero for carbon by the end of the decade, it will make no difference to climate change.  We will still lose the oceans; we will have catastrophic climate change and potentially 90% of humanity will not survive.  https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-63657-6

We will need resources for microscope, underwater microphones, viewing platforms, accommodation for visitors and students, and cover the cost of indigenous people staff etc etc.    It is our plan to make the facility self-funding, we are spending 500,000 usd of our own money, we will probably need match funding to make it all work.

Project Bocus, dolphin, and Eco centre 500,000 usd