THE OCEAN AWAKENS

Co-founder and Co-Director of Under The Pole. Fascinated by oceans since childhood, Emmanuelle Périé-Bardout is a skipper and rebreather diver. After working for several years with explorer Jean-Louis Étienne, she has dedicated herself to Under The Pole expeditions since 2008.

She is particularly committed to ensuring that each field mission helps advance the protection of the oceans and the marine ecosystems of the mesophotic zone (30-200 metres).

Zak Risinger serves as Director of Engagement and Public Programs at the South Street Seaport Museum where he oversees over 200 public offerings annually. In this role, he works to strengthen community relationships, broaden audiences, and help expand the scope in which the Museum interprets the history of New York.

Zak has consulted museums throughout the United States and Canada on best practices to engage audiences with art, history, and science; served on numerous cultural panels; and presented at multiple national museum conferences. During his time with Museum Hack he curated unique, engaging experiences at major museums including the MET, American Museum of Natural History, Art Institute of Chicago, and Philadelphia Museum of Art.

Zak is a collaborator with Independent Curators International; serves as a cultural advisor for Paramount, Nike, Deloitte, Spotify and various Broadway productions; and can be seen in multiple episodes of Mysteries at the Museum.

Alexandre Dechelotte is a former Merchant Navy officer and self-taught entrepreneur. A graduate of the French National Maritime Academy (ENSM), he spent years navigating commercial vessels, particularly in Asia, where he witnessed firsthand the scale of ocean plastic pollution. That experience marked a turning point in his career.

In 2016, he co-founded Plastic Odyssey with Simon Bernard. Today, he oversees the organization’s development, communications, and partnerships while remaining closely connected to expedition work. His maritime background informs a pragmatic, field-oriented approach to building solutions that can operate under real-world constraints.

Fabien Lamaison is a social and climate entrepreneur and the Executive Director of Plastic Odyssey Fund, the U.S. nonprofit arm of the global Plastic Odyssey initiative. In 2024, he co-founded the Fund alongside Simon Bernard and Alexandre Dechelotte to mobilize American philanthropy, corporate partners, and innovation ecosystems in support of Plastic Odyssey’s expeditions and marine ecosystem restoration.

Based in San Francisco, Fabien leads the Fund’s strategy, partnerships, and fundraising efforts to support Plastic Odyssey’s global missions, including expeditions to some of the world’s most remote and plastic-polluted coastal environments.

Prior to Plastic Odyssey, Fabien spent more than two decades building and scaling technology ventures across fintech and impact innovation. His work focuses on developing practical, scalable solutions that connect entrepreneurship, philanthropy, and environmental action.

Tom is the founding partner of At One Ventures, which backs early-stage (Seed, Series A) companies using disruptive deep tech to upend the unit economics of established industries while dramatically reducing their planetary footprint.

Previous to founding At One, Tom was a founding member of Google X where he led the teams that created self-driving cars, deep learning artificial intelligence, wearable augmented reality and internet connectivity expansion. He played a significant role in established projects with global reach including Microsoft (Outlook) and Yahoo (Search, Answers).

He has also spent time in the developing world and via social entrepreneurship accelerators, mentoring 200+ entrepreneurs working on global development issues such as access to clean water, electricity, education, health care, and employment.

Tom has spoken at TED Countdown, Aspen Institute, YPO, SuperVenture, IDEO, Unreasonable and Summit at Sea. He is also a lifelong inventor, with 77 patents across hardware, software, design, and mechanical systems.

Simon Bernard is a former merchant navy officer and environmental entrepreneur. He founded Plastic Odyssey to confront plastic pollution where it harms biodiversity most, in remote and protected marine ecosystems.

Simon leads expedition design and field operations, ensuring that each mission combines practical removal, scientific collaboration, and documented results. His maritime background shapes the organization’s disciplined, field-first approach.

He regularly joins missions onboard, working directly with crew, scientists, and local partners to refine methods and strengthen restoration standards.

Laurent Corbel joins us from New York City, where he works as an investor and strategic advisor supporting ship owners, operators, and project developers in deploying wind-assisted propulsion as a practical pathway to decarbonizing shipping.

He is the co-founder of Wind Support NYC, an initiative advancing the adoption of wind propulsion across the North American maritime ecosystem. Laurent produces the Hoisting the Sail podcast and works with the Webb Institute and the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy to co-organize the annual Sustainability in Ship Design and Operations conference, bringing together ports, shipyards, technology providers, and operators.

Laurent also serves as Neoline’s representative for the United States and Canada, leading stakeholder engagement and commercial development across North America for the French shipping company.

Since October 2025, Neoline has been operating a low-emission transatlantic shipping service connecting France, USA, Canada, and Belgium with the Neoliner Origin, a 136-meter roll-on/roll-off cargo vessel powered primarily by wind, currently the world’s largest commercial sailing cargo ship.

Previously, Laurent served as Executive Vice President of FircoSoft Americas (2005-2017), where he led North American expansion and built strategic partnerships in highly regulated markets. This experience informs his work at the intersection of maritime innovation, commercial development, and sustainability.

Laurent advocates for pragmatic, collaborative solutions that accelerate wind propulsion at scale and strengthen sustainable transatlantic trade.

Luc des Vallières is a globally sought-after expert on all things packaging and materials. He joined Plastic Odyssey in 2024, where he leads partnerships. Luc has consulted for FMCG leaders about replacing plastic in their supply chains, conducted due diligence for impact venture funds, and produced research around the decarbonization of packaging materials. His areas of expertise include plastic alternatives, biopolymers and the bioeconomy, waste management and prevention, material end-of-life (EOL) and compostability, LCA and GHG protocols.

A former French Navy Marine Officer, French-born Luc is a sailor at heart. His deep love for the ocean inspired his lifelong mission to fight and solve the marine plastic waste crisis.

After working for nearly 10 years in the renewable marine energy sector, where he developed major projects in maritime environments, Jacques Barreau became actively involved in the Grain de Sail project as early as 2015. This project combines the production of coffee and chocolate with the ownership and operation of low-carbon sailing cargo vessels. Specialized in project development, organization, and financing, he is committed to turning ideas into reality. As Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer, he oversees the daily management of the Grain de Sail Group and ensures, in particular, the strict compatibility to the environmental and social standards that the company has defined since its creation.

Emmanuel Schalit is a Franco-American Entrepreneur, CEO, Board Director, and Angel Investor. He is the CEO of OceanWings. OceanWings, leader in maritime transport decarbonation, is a French industrial company that designs, manufactures and markets OceanWings®, rigid wings designed for installation on cargo ships and yachts, helping to reduce CO2 emissions by cutting fossil fuel consumption. Prior to his appointment as CEO, he was the Chairman of the Board at OceanWings since November 2021.

Prior to joining OceanWings’ board, Emmanuel was Co-Founder and CEO of Dashlane which he led for 9 years, growing the company from 4 to 350 employees, raising more than $200 million in capital from tier 1 US investors. Prior to Dashlane, Emmanuel was the CEO of CBS Outdoor France, a top 3 Outdoor advertising company, the COO of LMG Group, a leading international publishing group, and SVP at Vivendi Universal where he led a global K-12 Publishing division with 1.5 billion € in revenue.

Emmanuel holds a master’s degree in Math and Physics from Ecole Polytechnique in Paris and a PhD in Computer Science from Université de Toulouse. He also studied Marketing and Finance in the Executive Education Program at Harvard Business School.

Tegan Hoffmann has over 30 years of experience in building resilient solutions for coastal communities, blue economy, and coastal ocean biodiversity. At Coastal Quest, Tegan focuses on developing public-private partnerships to get funding resources on the ground for multi-benefit coastal solutions. She leads an organization with the goal of building human and financial capacity across sectors to scale solutions, developing new models and pilots, such as the Santa Clara Climate Resilience Fund, scaling nature-based solutions in California State Parks, and securing sea level rise planning funding for all of the California coastal jurisdictions. Prior to joining Coastal Quest, Tegan worked as a consultant and supported 100+ strategic planning engagements, many focused on Blue Economy impact investing and 40+ projects focused on funding and financing. She helped organizations raise or leverage over USD$733,000,000, including Fondo Mexicano para la Conservación de la Naturaleza, Inter-American Development Bank, The Global Environment Fund, and others.

Jeremy Pochman is a co-founder and the CEO of 11th Hour Racing and Ocean Hour Farm. Working across both organizations, Jeremy seeks to underscore the intersection of ocean and land, and us humans, who are in the middle, and how we can push each other to find better solutions for the sea and the soil.

As the Managing Partner of Propeller, Rodrigo leads investments and guides the fund’s strategy and overall operations.

At Propeller, Rodrigo leads the firm’s investment in Vatn Systems, SuperGround, and one stealth investment.

Rodrigo most recently was a member of the venture capital team inside of Amazon’s Worldwide Corporate Development division. He was the founder of Amazon’s $2Bn Climate Pledge Fund and was an investor for the Alexa Fund where he also ran the Alexa Accelerator. While at Amazon, Rodrigo was responsible for over 40 investments in early-stage startups innovating across areas of climate-tech and voice and ambient computer technologies. Notable investments include electric aviation company, Beta (NYSE: BETA), Resilient Power Systems (Acquired: Eaton Corporation), Forum Mobility, Ion Energy, Comet Labs, Pulse Labs, Symbl.ai (Acquired: Invoca), Sensible Object (Acquired: Niantic), AnyCart (Acquired: Weee!), Sweepr (Acquired: Plume Design), Doppio Games (Acquired: Fortis), tado, Endel, and Novel Effect.

Earlier in his career, Rodrigo was a partner at Nth Power, the first venture capital fund to focus on energy technology startups, and was later the founder of Shuddle. Rodrigo served as a senior aide to the U.S. Department of State and was a member of the U.S. delegation to the Kyoto Conference of the Parties on Climate Change. He received his MBA from the Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley, and his undergraduate degree from Middlebury College. He bikes more than he drives, likes to fly fish in fresh and saltwater, and he is never shy about sharing his passion for sourdough baking.

Anne Park is CEO of Sustainable Ocean Alliance (SOA) and Principal at Seabird Ventures, where she leads investments in early-stage ocean-positive innovation globally. She brings two decades of experience at the intersection of investing and sustainable development, scaling purpose-driven organizations and deploying capital for impact.

Previously, Anne spent over a decade at SEAF, a pioneering impact investing firm, where she built global impact measurement and management systems and expanded entrepreneur support programs across emerging and frontier markets. Earlier, she served at USAID and the U.S. Department of State, structuring catalytic capital initiatives and supporting underserved entrepreneurs worldwide.

Anne’s commitment to ocean and community impact began as a Peace Corps volunteer in the Philippines, where she witnessed the connection between environmental sustainability and economic opportunity. She holds a Master’s in Public Administration with a focus on finance from Cornell University and dual Bachelor’s degrees from UC Santa Barbara.

Ann Carpenter is dedicated to building and fostering the global blue economy. She serves as an advisor to deep tech entrepreneurs in industries including ocean/maritime, transportation and goods movement, energy, and biotech. She brings more than 30 years of experience in strategic planning, marketing, business development, and community outreach in corporate and nonprofit organizations.

As co-founder and CEO of Braid Theory, Ann is responsible for strategic partnership building with public entities such as ports and utility agencies, and private industry. To further initiatives addressing global challenges and a more sustainable future, Ann also serves on the boards of Smart Freight Centre and Ocean Exchange.

Christina Ross leads science and sustainability strategy for consumer product companies navigating today’s most complex public health, environmental health, and sustainability challenges.

At Credo Beauty, she oversees product safety, sustainability, ingredient policy, and industry partnerships. Over the past decade, Christina has worked across scientific consulting, retail, product development, and regulatory affairs, helping organizations build safer, more transparent products and stronger systems for consumer trust.

Her work has been featured in The New York Times, The Guardian, and Vogue Business, and she has spoken at events including Aspen Ideas: Climate.

Amir is Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer of Shellworks where he leads the development of Vivomer, a genuine alternative to plastic. It performs like plastic in use, yet breaks down naturally once disposed of, leaving no microplastics and no waste. Vivomer integrates into existing manufacturing lines, requires no behaviour change from consumers, and is already in market, with over 13 million units of packaging this year alone shipped to brands across personal care, cosmetics, and wellness. Amir holds master’s degrees from the Royal College of Art and Imperial College London in both Architecture and Engineering and has spent the past 18 years at the intersection of design, engineering, and science with a specific focus on natural materials. His work is driven by a belief that the materials of the future must be as functional as they are responsible.

With 20 years of experience in beauty, Charlotte de Pitray has built her career at the intersection of beauty, health and consumer brands.

She spent 12 years at L’Oréal, mostly at La Roche-Posay before joining KRESK Group in 2018, where she took on the leadership of SVR, the French dermatological skincare brand.

She has always been drawn to a different kind of beauty: one that respects the skin and people’s health. When she joined SVR, she saw an opportunity to take that conviction further by connecting skin health with environmental health.

This led her to make endocrine disruptors and safer formulation a key pillar of SVR’s journey, creating a powerful link between efficacy, consumer safety and responsibility.

Today, as General Manager, she leads SVR’s global growth and brand development.

What drives her is building brands that do things right — products that are good for people and better for the planet — and making better choices genuinely desirable to consumers.

Professor Sarah Dunlop (Emeritus Professor, University of Western Australia) is Director of Plastics & Human Health at Minderoo Foundation, where she leads a global mission to eliminate the harmful impacts of plastic pollution on people and accelerate the transition to safe and sustainable materials. She oversees an international portfolio spanning scientific research, policy engagement, investment mobilization and innovation, working with leading institutions including the University of Queensland, Neuroscience Research Australia (NeuRA), Imperial College London, the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, Boston College and others.

Professor Dunlop instigated landmark initiatives including the PERTH (Plastic Exposure Reduction Transforms Health) Trial, one of the first large-scale randomized controlled trials investigating whether reducing plastic exposure improves health outcomes. Her team also supports world-leading exposure science and analytical chemistry through partnerships with the University of Queensland - Minderoo Centre for Plastics and Human Health, and Imperial College, advancing global capability to measure plastic chemicals and micro- and nanoplastics in humans.

Beyond research, Professor Dunlop helps translate science into action through initiatives including the Lancet Countdown on Health and Plastics with Boston College, the Plastic Measurement Brains Trust (PMBT), and evidence generation supporting negotiations for a strong Global Plastics Treaty. Together, these efforts aim to strengthen accountability for plastic-related harms while accelerating the development and adoption of safer, clean, and more sustainable material solutions.

A neuroscientist by training, Professor Dunlop has led pioneering research spanning laboratory discovery, clinical trials and translational medicine. Today, she is recognized internationally for bringing together science, policy, investment and innovation to address one of the defining health challenges of our time.

Holly is Founder & Executive Director of The Plastics & Climate Project, the only science, policy, and communications initiative designed to account for all the climate impacts of plastics. She brought this expertise to the World Resources Institute (WRI) where she was a Senior Fellow. She served on the stakeholder advisory group helping craft the implementation rules for California’s plastic packaging reduction law, and is a nominator for Prince William’s Earthshot Prize.

Holly also founded Environment & Enterprise Strategies where she provides strategic guidance to such organizations as the Union of Concerned Scientists, the Elders, the World Economic Forum, C40, and Stand.earth. As a President Clinton appointee, she managed the climate issue at the U.S. Department of Defense, and served on the State Department’s UN climate treaty negotiations team.

She has degrees from Berkeley and from Harvard where she was a Leadership Fellow. See her LinkedIn for more information.

Judith Enck founded Beyond Plastics in 2019 to end plastic pollution through education, advocacy, organizing, and institutional change. Passionate about protecting public health and the environment, Judith teaches the nation’s first class on plastic pollution as a professor at Bennington College.

Judith has held top influential positions in state and federal government. Appointed by President Obama, she served as the Regional Administrator (Region 2) of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Previously, Judith served as Deputy Secretary for the Environment in the New York Governor’s Office and as a Policy Advisor to the New York State Attorney General. She was Senior Environmental Associate with the New York Public Interest Research Group, served as Executive Director for Environmental Advocates of New York and the Non-Profit Resource Center, and is a past President of Hudson River Sloop Clearwater. In December 2025, Judith became a first-time author with The Problem with Plastic, co-authored by Adam Mahoney.

Dr. Tracy A. Farrell is IUCN Regional Director for North America and CEO of the IUCN-US Fund, based in Washington, DC. With more than 25 years of global leadership in conservation and sustainable development, she has led subnational-to-global policy engagement, recently bringing California and Massachusetts as the first US subnational members, and serves as a lead spokesperson and diplomatic representative for IUCN across North America. She also transformed IUCN-US Fund, the US-based ‘friends-of’ for IUCN, quadrupling its portfolio. Dr Farrell oversees program, financial, and risk management operations for 45 staff managing $150 million in global projects. Prior to IUCN, she held senior leadership roles at Conservation International, including Vice President for Program Delivery & Monitoring and Regional Director for the Greater Mekong Program. Dr. Farrell holds a Ph.D. in Forestry and Natural Resource Management from Virginia Tech and serves on the boards of Project Learning Tree Canada and the Sustainable Forestry Institute.

Renée Sharp is a Senior Scientist and the Director of Plastics and Petrochemical Advocacy at the Natural Resources Defense Council, where she has led NRDC’s efforts to combat the health and environmental impacts of plastic since 2024. Sharp has more than twenty-five years of experience in environmental policy, research, and program implementation, with a focus on toxic chemicals and plastic pollution. Before joining NRDC, she served as the research director for the Environmental Working Group, as a strategic advisor for Safer States, and consulted for other national Environmental NGOs including the Sierra Club and the League of Conservation Voters.

Andy has dedicated his career to the protection and restoration of marine and coastal ecosystems. Originally from the Little Miami watershed of Ohio, he first came to Kodiak as a U.S. Coast Guard officer, serving two tours before deciding to make Alaska home. After leaving the Coast Guard, he built a marine operations company that today operates a fleet of vessels supporting marine research for government agencies and universities throughout Alaska.

Over the course of his career, Andy has helped lead the removal of more than one million pounds of marine debris from Alaska's coastlines. In 2018, he co-founded Ocean Plastics Recovery Project to expand and accelerate that work. He is also the founding president of +Nature, a nonprofit that bridges conservation, science, and economics to advance durable investments in nature.

Andy lives year-round in Kodiak with his wife, where they are raising two teenagers.

Hanna Dijkstra is a plastic pollution scientist, circular economy expert, and science communicator based in Amsterdam. She completed her PhD at the Institute for Environmental Studies (IVM) at VU Amsterdam, where her research focused on solutions to marine plastic pollution. Her work sits at the intersection of environmental science, international policy, and innovation, translating research into decisions that industry and governments can act on.

She joined Plastic Odyssey’s expedition as an on-board scientist, serves on the Secretariat of the Innovation Alliance for a Global Plastics Treaty (IAGPT), and is Operations Manager at Ubuntoo. Across these roles she works to advance the knowledge and the action needed to reduce plastic pollution and build more sustainable systems. She is also a passionate science communicator, sharing her work through her newsletter Ripples to Waves, keynotes, and presentations around the world.

Capucine Bourcart is a French artist based in New York City since 2006, with French and Vietnamese heritage. Her multidisciplinary practice has been exhibited nationally and internationally, including in New York, California, Boston, France, and Switzerland. Her work is held in museum collections in France and New York, and she has created several large-scale public artworks in New York City.

Bourcart has participated in art fairs including Art on Paper, Art Wynwood, and Flux Art Fair. She received the Paula Rhodes Memorial Award for exceptional achievement in Fine Arts at the School of Visual Arts, as well as grants from the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Uniqlo Park Expressions, and The Puffin Foundation.

She co-founded the artist collective Art Forms Us in 2020 and earned her MFA from the School of Visual Arts in 2023.

Aria Luna is one of the world’s youngest exhibiting artists and a changemaker who uses the power of art to raise awareness of environmental and social issues impacting local and global communities. Aria’s traveling exhibit Fusion Tide addresses plastic pollution in our oceans and has been hosted at Google, the City of Mountain View, the Consulate of Colombia, the Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco, and other venues.

Aria’s work has been exhibited internationally, won awards, sold to private collectors in the United States, and raised funds for ocean and rainforest conservation, ecotourism, art programs, and wildfire relief. Aria Luna has been featured on the Cartoon Network, ABC 7, NBC, and numerous local media outlets.

In addition to visual art, Aria is also an up-and-coming singer-songwriter, performing under the name kairo lucaz.

Ricky Rhodes is a Los Angeles-based director, producer, and communications strategist working across narrative, documentary, branded, and political film. He directed the United Nations' ocean treaty series, an eight-film body of work that helped carry the BBNJ agreement into international law, and currently serves as a communications strategist with the UN Division for Ocean Affairs and the Law of the Sea, promoting the World Ocean Assessment.

His documentary series Impossible Cleanups — extreme engineering at the ends of the earth, featuring Plastic Odyssey — is pre-sold internationally. His branded and political films have been seen tens of millions of times, and his award-winning narrative work includes an Oscar-qualifying short.

A lifelong surfer, Ricky is drawn to the most important stories on the planet, which are so often the ones no one can see. His films make them visible, because the impossible only becomes possible when people can feel it.

Max is a graduate of Western Washington University where he studied filmmaking at their Fairhaven College of Interdisciplinary Studies. His junior year he premiered his first award-winning feature length documentary, 3022ft. After graduating he turned his attention to documentary shorts fusing cinematography with bright whimsical watercolor and animation to create the films he wished existed.

He founded Trailbound Sketches in 2020 to connect people to the planet by sharing his trailside sketching adventures. Ever since, he has connected with people from all around the world through his vibrant Instagram community, acclaimed documentaries and impactful brand collaborations with those who prioritize environmentally sustainable practices.

Max is a Protect Our Winters Creative Alliance Member and has presented and spoken on the topic of art citizenship. Illustrating how the arts and film break down complex environmental issues, making them more easily understood by a broader audience. Speaking to local and global leaders at in-person and online events across the globe, including the UN Sustainable Destinations Summit held in 2022 in Mallorca. Furthermore, his work has been featured in countless film festivals and media outlets.

Under Max’s guidance, Trailbound Sketches has since grown into a production studio and engaging community. Where his team produces impactful nonfiction films, dynamic watercolor tutorials with environmental education woven into each lesson and beautiful products featuring his colorful artwork.

He is a father, husband and endurance athlete who has visually shown the world that anything is possible if you are willing to make that first scary mark. Max is also dyslexic and reminds people every day it’s ok if you don’t see the world like everyone else, there is room for you! There are no typos or misspellings in art!

Théo brings his playful attitude and detail-oriented mind to the world of watercolors. Often working in a sketchbook, he brings worlds to life and gives voice to unconventional characters. Some of his works feature whole cities built into the clever keys of a piano, others show sassy seagulls complaining about their footwear.

First trained in watercolor by artists on the shores of Ireland as a 12-year-old, Théo has brought his palette and colors with him back home to France, for a year in Milan, which greatly shows a revival of his art, and now to the home of the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, where he joined the Plastic Odyssey Fund team.

Most of Théo’s works are made as gifts, so if you’re lucky enough to receive one, hold it close!

Drogue harnesses the ocean’s thermal energy to generate affordable, off-grid electricity at sea to power the next generation of AI inference and a future maritime economy.

Dottir Labs, an MIT spinout, is driven by a vision to revolutionize manufacturing industries to drive optimization and environmental sustainability. Its mission is to bring full visibility into aquaculture, environmental monitoring, and manufacturing to enable maximal use of resources, reduction of waste and increasing yields.

GreenWave works to replicate and scale regenerative ocean farming: a zero-input kelp farming model that breathes life back into our oceans. Through farmer-led training and support, climate subsidies, and infrastructure and market development, GreenWave partners with coastal communities across North America to create a thriving blue economy.

GreenWave’s Kelp CoLab program brings together a select cohort of brands, ingredient suppliers, and product development experts to develop next-generation products using kelp-derived ingredients sourced from traceable, regenerative ocean farms. The inaugural cohort in personal care is launching 20 new products over the next year.

Juice Robotics is building High Dive, an aerial drone-deployed underwater sensing platform that delivers real-time ocean data without ships, crews, or traditional subsea vehicles.

On the tween deck: a potted camera sensor, their patented fiberoptic tether, and video of live deployments.

At Loam (formerly Travaras), we envision a world where travel is a transformative force for people and the planet. We are redefining the travel industry by making regenerative and sustainable travel the norm, not the exception.

Through our highly curated marketplace, we connect travelers with immersive experiences that honor local communities, cultures, and ecosystems. From off-the-beaten-path adventures to personalized recommendations, Loam makes it easy to travel thoughtfully, leave a positive impact, and explore the world with curiosity and care.

Join the movement. Sign up for our newsletter to stay updated on the latest experiences and stories: loamtravel.com/stories.

Marble is building a global network of drone stations deploying aircraft 24/7 to provide maritime monitoring, delivering the cost reduction needed to make marine protected area monitoring feasible. The system is currently in operation in Greenland, monitoring the melting of the ice sheet.

Oneka Technologies provides sustainable water supply from the ocean to coastal populations and industries, deploying wave-powered and solar-powered desalination solutions through long-term water-as-a-service agreements.

PolyGone Systems is a New Jersey-based cleantech company developing scalable, energy-efficient solutions for removing microplastics from water. Its patented filtration technology captures up to 99% of sub-millimeter microplastics across drinking water, wastewater, and industrial applications while minimizing operational impact.

PolyGone's industrial and municipal filtration systems have been deployed in both the U.S. and internationally for municipal and industrial wastewater treatment, food and beverage process water, and water reuse applications. PolyGone is also a leader in microplastic testing, with a dedicated microplastic analysis lab. Learn more at polygonesystems.com.

Retide is an ocean technology company building the digital infrastructure to make ocean-bound plastic recovery measurable, traceable and verifiable.

We combine satellite imagery, drone surveys, AI and field data to identify plastic pollution hotspots, support cleanup operations and track recovered material from collection through its downstream journey.

Our technology creates a digital evidence trail for every tonne recovered, providing the measurement, reporting and verification (MRV) needed to build trust in plastic recovery and plastic credits.

By connecting technology with local organizations doing the work on the ground, Retide aims to unlock new financing for ocean plastic recovery while giving companies and funders confidence that the environmental impact they support is real, traceable and independently verifiable.

Excess nitrogen from wastewater and agricultural runoff fuels the harmful algal blooms that collapse fisheries and create coastal dead zones. That nutrient loading also degrades the seagrass, eelgrass, and oyster beds that estuary food webs depend on. In urbanized estuaries like the San Francisco Bay, municipal treatment plants are the largest point source of that nitrogen discharge, contributing as much as two-thirds of the load.

Roca Water has designed a modular, membrane-free electrochemical system that captures nitrogen directly from wastewater and recovers it as high-purity fertilizer before it reaches the ocean. Our battery-inspired system has been designed to be highly durable and can operate for thousands of cycles with no loss in performance. Our system is also energy-efficient by design and requires < 10% of the footprint of conventional biological treatment. Roca is backed by a $3.7M ARPA-E award, with two San Francisco Bay utilities committed to hosting on-site demonstrations in 2027.

Seamoretech provides Critical Raw Materials extracted through proprietary brine valorization technology.

The company delivers an uninterrupted and fully traceable supply of critical minerals at a fraction of the cost and energy of conventional mining, while directly responding to global water scarcity. Its technology doubles freshwater recovery from desalination waste streams, achieving Zero Liquid Discharge compliance, and cutting carbon footprint by 80%.

Sway is a material innovation company scaling compostable solutions for plastic made with seaweed. Our patented products match the vital performance attributes of conventional plastics and plug into existing infrastructure, enabling scale and impact. Unlike plastic, Sway materials integrate abundant, regenerative resources and decompose into healthy soil after use, completing the loop of biological circularity.

Our market presence is rapidly expanding through partnerships with leading global packaging distributors and exemplary brands including J.Crew, Burton, Florence, prAna, and Faherty. In 2024, Sway was named a Fast Company World-Changing Idea. In 2023, Sway won first place in the TOM FORD Plastic Innovation Prize. As a member of the Sustainable Packaging Coalition, the Sustainable Ocean Alliance, and 1% for the Planet, Sway is working holistically to ensure our solutions catalyze a thriving, equitable future. Sway is headquartered in the California Bay Area.

Vital Ocean is an ocean intelligence company building OceanIQ, the Ocean Operating System — a platform that helps governments, industry, and conservation organizations make faster, smarter decisions about ocean use. OceanIQ integrates three layers: Ocean-GPT, a marine-domain language model trained on the world’s ocean science and governance literature; a 4D spatiotemporal digital twin that brings the marine environment to life in space and time; and a shared decision interface that turns complex data into clear, defensible action. From accelerating offshore permitting to protecting marine life, OceanIQ closes the gap between ocean data and ocean decisions. Deployed with international science bodies and piloted with federal regulators and industry leaders, Vital Ocean is building the digital infrastructure for a sustainable blue economy.

Vlinder is a blue carbon developer restoring mangroves in Kenya, Indonesia, and Brazil with local communities. Its key differentiator is combining Blue Carbon and Regenerative Aquaculture, replanting mangroves within active fish and shrimp ponds to boost pond productivity, lifting aquaculture income for farming communities alongside carbon credit revenue. Over six years, the model has restored 1,700 ha, realized a premium $45/credit price, earned a Sylvera AA-BBB rating, and benefited 22,000+ people. Vlinder signed a prepaid offtake agreement with a large Swiss private bank, its first major institutional buyer, validating the commercial model. The team is led by CEO Tom Kagerer (ex-BMW) alongside co-founders spanning carbon markets, fintech, project management, and marine science.