Meet ‘Collec’Thor’: Richmond’s new tool to clean up the Fraser River

At Steveston’s Fisherman’s Wharf, the marina is buzzing with people enjoying the late spring, warm weather, and beautiful water-side sights.

To help, the City of Richmond has launched a new tool in its arsenal to pull garbage and debris out of the Fraser River.

The machine, the “Collec’Thor”, is the first of its kind in use on the west coast of North America.

“It pulls in waste or floating debris in the area,” said Kristina Nishi, manager of recycling and waste recovery at the city. “We do have wild life in these waterways, so we don’t want to have plastics or anything harmful that they can consume.”

The City of Richmond has a new tool to pull garbage and debris out of the Fraser River — the “Collec’Thor”. (CityNews Image)

The trash skimmer lives on the side of the Fisherman’s Wharf dock and the city plans to have it running daily to collect debris from the marina.

“It pulls [debris] into the catch basin at the bottom. That’s were all the larger bigger pieces of waste are collected and then the water gets pumped up to the top two reservoirs,” Nishi explained, adding the skimmer can hold 100 kilograms of waste.

The litter the skimmer captures can include plastics, cigarette butts, tooth picks, styrofoam, and other nasties.

Nishi says the trash collected will be taken back to the city’s works yard to be weighed, separated, and analyzed by an environmental group to get a better understanding of the materials commonly found in the Fraser River.

At the wharf, fresh, locally caught seafood is sold daily — including spot prawns, sea urchins, and fish.

“[The debris] causes a lot of havoc for life in the ocean,” Nishi told CityNews.

“We are an Island city – we are the last stop at the Fraser River before we reach the ocean. There is about eight to 10 pieces of plastic entering the ocean and there is five garbage patches floating out in the seas, so we need to do out best to stop it before it gets out there,” Nishi added.

Sea urchins being sold by vendors in Richmond. The City of Richmond has a new tool to pull garbage and debris out of the Fraser River — the “Collec’Thor”. (CityNews Image)

Professor Rashid Sumaila from the Department of Oceans and Fisheries Economics at the University of British Columbia says plastics can survive in water forever, and that’s not good for the food chain.

“Plastic breaks down over time into micro plastics, and the fish think it’s algae — they think its food. And the fish eat it and it leads to fish having health problem and we eat them and that causes health problems for people,” Sumaila explained.

The banning of single use plastics, and plastic bags in some municipalities, is a good start to reducing plastic in the ocean Sumaila says, but we can do more.

“When you vote, have the environment in mind, because without the environment we are gone,” the professor said.