Sailing Toward Solutions

Emily’s relationship with the ocean began in childhood. She grew up sailing small racing dinghies, starting in what she describes as little more than a bathtub with a sail, before progressing to racing skiffs and competing for Britain as a teenager.

Her career, however, was originally pointed in a very different direction. She studied architecture and had a job lined up in Australia, but decided she wanted to travel there from the UK without flying. That decision led her to Earthrace, a biofuel-powered vessel that had broken the round-the-world speed record and was setting off on a global promotional tour for renewable energy.

Emily wrote to the skipper, joined the boat in Brighton for a weekend, and did not go home for 933 days. What began as an unconventional journey to Australia became the experience that reshaped her life.

Today, eXXpedition’s purpose is to connect people with the plastic crisis so they can discover their own role in tackling it. The work rests on three pillars: science, storytelling and action.

Over the past decade, the science has evolved significantly. Early expeditions searched for visible accumulations of plastic. Then came the focus on microplastics, as larger pieces broke down into smaller fragments. When those fragments were found entering the food chain, the work expanded to include toxic chemicals and the way they might move through the environment and into living systems.

Now, the mission is increasingly focused on solutions. By looking for patterns between the plastic found on land and at sea, eXXpedition aims to identify where pollution is coming from and provide evidence that governments, businesses and individuals can use to act.

Citizen science can take many forms, from community reporting apps to local monitoring projects. eXXpedition’s model is distinct: it brings people who are not necessarily trained scientists into controlled research environments, enabling them to work with sophisticated equipment and contribute to credible data collection.

This approach creates a powerful exchange. Participants gain a valuable and often life-changing experience, while their involvement helps fund scientific research that might otherwise be difficult to carry out.

There is also a deeper educational effect. When participants examine, classify and log individual pieces of plastic, patterns begin to emerge. A particular wrapper found repeatedly on a beach, or plastic linked to fish farms in a specific region, turns a global crisis into something local, visible and actionable.

Turning science into policy is difficult. Emily is candid about the challenge, particularly in relation to the long and often disheartening negotiations around a global plastics treaty.

Part of the difficulty is that plastic pollution does not have one universal solution. What works in one location may not be relevant in another. Much of the nuance can be lost when the issue is addressed only at a global level.

For that reason, eXXpedition’s science is becoming increasingly local and place-based. When data can show exactly what the problem is in a particular city, country or coastal system, it becomes much easier to identify the right intervention and influence meaningful policy. The design of the scientific program, and the data it collects, directly shapes whether practical change can follow.

Emily encourages people to think beyond neutrality and toward being net positive. Each of us has a sphere of influence, whether in a workplace, a school, a community, a family office, a company or a creative field. That sphere is where meaningful change can begin.

She calls this your superpower. It may be redesigning a product, changing a supply chain, choosing venues differently, telling stories in a new way or influencing how a business buys, builds or behaves. The point is not that everyone must do everything. It is that everyone can do something.