Putting sustainability innovation with action, founder of Ocean Recovery Alliance, Doug Woodring, is changing the face of plastic regeneration, turning what was once seen as waste into commodity. 

 

Don’t call Doug Woodring an activist. From environmental entrepreneur to founder of sustainability startups, Woodring’s title is ever-changing, depending on his project at hand. Sometimes he is the missing link between stakeholders on the brink of a breakthrough. Other times, he is the average good Samaritan, called to action after first-hand experience with plastic pollution in our oceans. 

 

The most fitting title of all, he says, is actionist. 

 

“An actionist to me is someone who gets things done,” Woodring says. “I don’t say, ‘I’m one person. I can’t solve the problem’. I’d instead see something that I know it can be fixed and then I just go and try to do that.” 

 

That’s how he convinced Hong Kong’s iconic Watson’s Water to pivot to using 100% recycled plastic over one meal in 2014. And how his team worked with communities along the Tonlé Sap – the largest freshwater lake in Southeast Asia and one of the most biodiverse ecosystems in the world – to reduce the waste that ends up in the waters. 

 

And, despite having worked in the field of plastic waste reduction since founding Ocean Recovery Alliance in 2010, Woodring’s many projects ahead is the example that great change begins with one person – so long as this person embodies the values of an actionist. 

 

Doug Woodring, founder of Ocean Recovery Alliance 

 

 

Humble Beginnings 

 

Growing up in California, Woodring spent his childhood enjoying clear seas and clean beaches, but a deep-sea diving trip in 2008 painted a bleaker picture of the real condition of our oceans. “There was plastic suspended at all different levels under the water, like Jell-O. Floating Jell-O.” 

 

What he came across was part of what we know today as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a collection of marine debris in the Pacific Ocean. Even though the trip began off the coast of Palau, it was clear to Woodring that the plastic waste was likely swept off the coasts of big cities and ended up there thanks to converging currents in the Pacific Ocean.  

  

“That’s when I said, ‘What’s going on? No one’s even talking about this in the right way.” he recalls. 

 

Less than a year later, in 2009, Woodring and a team from Scripps Institution of Oceanography – a research department of UC San Diego Woodring likened to NASA for the seas – took a 3-week scientific research expedition to the North Pacific Gyre. “We found all kinds of data, and plastic, microplastic, in every single sample,” he says. “That was a big wow moment. The industry took note, and governments took note, and then it started the next chapter in this whole ocean story.” 

 

The Ocean Recovery Alliance team worked with communities along the Tonlé Sap – the largest freshwater lake in Southeast Asia – to reduce the waste that ends up in the waters 

 

 

The Issue of Plastic 

 

Recycling plastic is like making an omelette, but in reverse. “If you make an omelette for me with cheese, mushroom, ham, peppers and milk, I’d say, ‘Wow, that looks great!'” Woodring explains. “But please take that apart and put it back together into the original form. That’s how hard recycling is.” 

 

Part of the problem is with the plastic itself. “There're seven main families of plastic, but there're over 40,000 types of plastic in those families, all with different chemical properties, different colours, different melting points, sizes, shapes and weights,” he says. 

 

That, in combination with companies often choosing their packaging and materials with design and cost in mind rather than sustainability and regeneration, means a hodgepodge of different plastics, none of which can be recycled together. “Brands want to be individual and look different, so one wants a green cap, one wants a red cap,” Woodring says, “The problem is, when you have all those different things, the omelette gets so much more complicated.” 

 

The solution is not exactly as simple as recycling. “Domestic circular economies are almost impossible for plastic,” Woodring explains. “You need enough machinery and equipment in every single country to recover the material, clean it, process it and make it useful for manufacturing. And most countries don't even have the manufacturing to feed the plastic back into because that's all done in different countries.” 

 

Part of the solution is targeting major companies with low-cost and design-forward alternatives, much like how Woodring convinced Watson’s Water to move to 100% recycled materials. 

 

Tonlé Sap is one of the most biodiverse ecosystems in the world. 

 

But Woodring needed an answer that matched the problem in size – thus leading to the birth of Rebound Plastic Exchange, a global marketplace for recycled plastic where countries can trade “in a legitimate, trusted, certified manner,” he explains, noting that accountability is often missing from the world of recycling. 

 

Following Woodring’s successful pitch to the United Arab Emirates and Abu Dhabi, Rebound Plastic Exchange launched in September 2022 with Woodring as the lead expert. 

 

“It’s the world’s first commodity-type exchange feed for recycled plastic feedstock,” he explains of the accomplishment. 

 

But what happens after the plastic is effectively processed and traded? That, too, is Woodring’s next mission. “It’s the second life of plastic. That’s the critical part.” 

 

The answer, he hopes, is in sustainable building materials, a project in testing stages in nearly a dozen countries across Asia. “To mix dirty plastic, which will never get recycled, and put it into concrete as a synthetic aggregate, basically makes the concrete lighter, stronger, [waste absorbent], insulated and also avoids the use of sand,” Woodring says, noting the key differences in the technology from plastic brick or buildings. 

 

“Only 6 or 8% [unrecyclable plastic added to concrete] is enough to make a giant difference in our cities.” 

 

“Every single piece of plastic that someone’s hand touched before will become garbage” – Doug Woodring.

 

 

A Solution in Innovation 

 

Change begins at positing the business of sustainability not as volunteer, do-gooder work, but as that of entrepreneurs and innovators, of business leaders and decision makers. “There are huge, huge opportunities for investment. The world is changing now,” he explains. “Corporations want to do better things. They realise they’ve got to be more engaged, rather than doing a little volunteer thing once a year for their annual report photo.” 

 

That possibility exists at every level – from governments and NGOs to heavy industry, down to the chiefs of river communities looking for ways to keep waste out of the Tonlé Sap. 

 

But Woodring doesn’t discount grassroots efforts like a beach clean-up or picking trash off the sidewalk. After all, he is the example that great change begins with just one person. 

 

“Every single piece of plastic that someone’s hand touched before will become garbage,” Woodring said. “That means every single thing out there is one hand away from being fixed.” 

 

"Every single thing out there is one hand away from being fixed.” - Doug Woodring