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Pictured with the Willow Park Water Bottle, made of Sugar Cane - Paddy Shanahan - M5
I live by the sea in Sandycove and started to notice plastic pollution on beach clean ups. I became the green schools rep for my class in 4th form and learnt about the damage caused by plastic pollution. In STEM class we entered theINTEL Mini scientist competition and I came 3rd in local Schools with TRIPLE TAP, an irrigation system reusing plastic bottles.
I got a biodegradable water bottle made of sugar cane. I thought this was brilliant and I brought it into school to show Ms Hannon. It looked just like a plastic bottle and could go in the dishwasher but was made from sugarcane. It could degrade without causing any harm to the planet. Ms Hannon loved the bottle and gave me the morning off school to go around the other classes and present my bottle, explaining about the 2.5m bottles of water sold daily in Ireland, how they take 450 years to degrade releasing micro plastics which are ingested into the food chain in our seas. Plastic bottles are our biggest litter source and only 34% were recycled last year. Our drinking water in Ireland is a high standard and nice to drink. A reusable bottle would help the problem. There is also aTAP MAP APP so you can find where to fill your bottle when you are out in town.
Mr Doherty heard about my bottle and asked me to come up with costs and what we could sell the bottles for and a design using the school logo. Mr Doherty ordered 500 bottles for the school and it became the school bottle. My class made posters to put around the school and we all sold the bottles in the hub before school and at sports day. We gave the profits to RNLI and a beach clean up charity. Two other schools nearby got the sugarcane bottles for their school when they saw ours. The school used the bottle company,refil.ie to provide water on sports day so it could be a plastic free event.
Ms Hannon asked me to enter the competition to become adelegate in the Youth Assembly on Climate Change in theDail on November 15th. I had to do a video pitch and answer lots of questions online. They called me to say I was on the short list and I had to do a telephone interview. On Saturday October 5th I got the good news that I had been selected as one of the 157 delegates from around the country.
There will be an information day to teach debating skills and on how to present in the Dail. Then we will go to the Dail on November 15th. Hopefully we can help ban single use plastics in Ireland and find an alternative.
I think most people want to fix our problems but they seem too big. We need our government to lead the way but it is everybody's problem and we need to work together. Me and my friends are really worried about climate change and what the world will be like when we grow up.. We can do it if we keep going.
By Paddy Shanahan - M5
Delegate - Youth Assembly on Climate Change
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