On this website, at Info & Downloads, you will find the open-source information and concepts on nurdle and microplastic pollution that Nurdle Soup (2019-2023), a former student team from Eindhoven University of Technology, has acquired. All are accessible, for free!In 2023, 32% of produced plastics is still leaking into Earth’s ecosystems, posing a significant threat to ecological and public health. Nurdles, small plastic pellets used in plastic production, are a major contributor to microplastic pollution, with an annual quantity of 200,000 tonnes entering ecosystems. Despite the ecological damage caused by nurdles, industries have little incentive to minimize their loss or clean up spillages. Efforts have been made to raise awareness and address the nurdle issue through legislation and best practices, but there are still widespread leakages and accumulations of pellets in precious ecosystems.
Nurdle Soup aimed to make a positive impact by developing intelligent plastic detection technology to provide hard data on pollution sites. Our goal was to inspire companies and policymakers, initiate cleaning campaigns, evaluate pollution mitigation efforts, and advocate for better policies. The team unfortunately had to disband in 2023 but our vision and ideas remain highly valuable, and are therefore presented on this open-source website! All information and ideas are free to use, and free to download!
The documents are in-depth, living packages, consisting of visions and missions, niche research and decision trees, solution concepts, stakeholder analysis, funding possibilities, organisational insights, etc. It serves to inspire and provide you – innovators, interested parties and individuals, and stakeholders – with a substantiated information base for;
- tackling nurdle pollution in your region and network;
- launching a new project and/or research;
- designing, building, programming and delivering a Minimum Viable Product that will inspire NGOs, industries, legislators, etc. to actively clean plastic pollution
Please contact us if you have questions or want to start a project on your own; we would love to stay involved!
OUR VISION
Improve the state of the marine environment
Plastic, a man-made product, has been entering water systems on a ginormous scale since the 1960s, and poses a major threat to both marine- and public health. It is our responsibility and an investment in the future to improve the state of the marine environment to its once-great condition of the past.
Pollution of microplastics cannot be accepted
Plastics should no longer enter the water, period. This includes all kinds of plastics, but especially microplastics. Due to their small size, toxin-saturation, and destructive potential to both flora and fauna, spillage and pollution of microplastics cannot be accepted.
OUR MISSION
STRIVE TO FILL
AN UNMET NEED
Nurdle Soup strove to fill an unmet need in environmental sensing and create more awareness for the global problem of microplastics, by using self-developed, instantaneous and intelligent microplastic detection-technology. We wanted to build such a device to provide feedback as to how all of our efforts to reduce and mitigate plastic pollution are working.
Detect
Our devices aimed to detect microplastics and plastic granulates that flood marine ecosystem and pose a threat to both animals and humans. You cannot manage what you cannot yet detect.
MAP
The most important enabling capability of our concepts – compared to the existing effects, but slow methods – was to instantaneously and reliably get data on quantity, composition, and location, to map various waterbodies and their microplastic-pollution levels.
stop
With this hard data, we strove to change the processes of the conventional plastic industry, and aid cleanups by being able to better direct our finite resources to what is most effective.
About us
We were a multidisciplinary team from Eindhoven University of Technology, founded in 2019, with the goal of making a change within the sustainability-related area of plastic pollution.
Feel free to contact us with the form below if you have any questions regarding our project or questions about opportunities for you in our team!
In collaboration with...
