Jimmy Donaldson, who goes by the youtube name Mr. Beast, has built his name and brand off of giving to others in extreme ways. So far, he has given millions of dollars away in both money and other forms including a private island, cars, and even houses. Yet, Mr. Beast is giving back in a way he never has before. Mr. Beast is attempting to give back to the Earth by raising $30 million to clean up the oceans. He is partnering with Team Seas, and hundreds of other influencers across the globe. 

Mr. Beast noticed a problem in the environment and he decided that he wanted to help. Currently, there are approximately five trillion pieces of trash in the ocean, equaling close to 17.6 billion pounds which is the equivalent of 57,000 blue whales. Yet, the garbage does not accumulate equally worldwide. There are great gyres across the oceans where trash accumulates into large piles due to the ocean tides bringing trash there and keeping it there.

This cleanup will attempt to remove one pound of trash for every dollar donated towards the cause. Half of the money will be going towards floating trash collecting robots placed in the world’s most polluted rivers, since 80% of the trash in the ocean comes from only 100 rivers. The other half of the money will go towards funding cleanup crews that will directly clean up trash from the gyres.

The trash collecting robots that Mr. Beast is funding with Team Seas are extremely efficient at eliminating waste from rivers. The way the robots work is quite unique as well, since they are floating in the river. The robots have a border that extends from the rpbots to the side of the river that works with the currents to funnel trash into them. A conveyor belt then lifts the trash into large trash bins inside the boat that will send a signal to a local cleanup team once full. The teams can then easily empty the trash bins in just a few minutes. By eradicating trash from these rivers, up to 80% of the trash entering the ocean can be eliminated.

Mr. Beasts’ attempts to clean up the oceans are noble; however, he cannot eliminate all the trash in the ocean. The larger problem is the conditions that the people by these rivers face. The towns that dump trash into rivers have no other choice. The towns usually face poverty and do not have sanitary means of disposing trash, giving them no other choice than to dump the trash into rivers. This problem is much bigger than what Mr. Beast can face though; it requires much more work and effort by governments to end the problem.

Mr. Beast has raised just over $16 million for his cleanup, yet he still has much more work to do in order to meet his goal of $30 million. Although it is likely that he will reach his goal, it will only fix a fraction of the problem, with trillions of pieces of trash that will still be left to clean up from the oceans.