Healthy Ocean Project

The 34th America’s Cup Is More Than A Sport
The Event Authority is committed to delivering a model sustainable sporting event and to leave a positive legacy in the local community on the sport of sailing.

The Event Authority is committed to delivering a model sustainable sporting event and to leave a positive legacy in the local community on the sport of sailing. Each event also provides us with an opportunity to engage with the public to deliver a positive message and raise environmental awareness.

The America’s Cup Event Authority has embraced the opportunity to showcase the 34th America’s Cup as a model sustainable event.

For the America’s Cup Event Authority, sustainability is about optimizing the social, economic and environmental impacts of our activities in delivering the 34th America’s Cup, to enrich the communities we visit and protect natural ecosystems.

The America’s Cup have committed to hosting an environmentally responsible event, which involves paying particular attention to areas such as minimizing air emissions and waste, and maximizing opportunities for energy efficiency and sustainable travel solutions.

America’s Cup is committed to ensuring the inclusion of a wide range of Bay Area communities in event activities through initiatives like youth engagement, local business initiative AC Connect and a volunteer program.

Economically, projections are for a positive economic impact linked to the San Francisco events in excess of $1billion for the Bay Area.

But sustainability is also about more than just how the America’s Cup Event Authority delivers its events. The America’s Cup Event Authority is also committed to leaving a lasting legacy for the benefit of future generations.

Through the America’s Cup Healthy Ocean Project, a collaboration between the America’s Cup and leading ocean conservation groups, the America’s Cup Event Authority will use the global reach and appeal of the world’s greatest sailing event to inspire millions of people to CARE about the Ocean, encourage public ACTION for the Ocean and leave a physical ocean LEGACY.

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AC Healthy Ocean Project

The 34th America’s Cup Healthy Ocean Project is a Global “Call to Action” Campaign that embraces the connection between sailing and the ocean.

Recognizing that millions of people will be watching the world’s greatest sailing race, we wanted to utilize the global footprint of the Cup to evoke change around ocean conservation.

Our overall goal of the Healthy Ocean Project is to create awareness around the problems that face the ocean and inspire individual action around the solutions that exist.  We focus our efforts on three core issues – Marine Protected Areas, Sustainable Seafood and Marine Debris/Plastics.

Take Action: Help Us Protect the Ocean NOW

America’s Cup Healthy Ocean Project Film and Lecture Series Presents: Sprague Theobald and his newest project The Other Side of The Ice

Join Emmy Award-Winning documentary filmmaker, sailor and author, Sprague Theobald, as he discusses his newest project THE OTHER SIDE OF THE ICE as part of the America’s Cup Healthy Ocean Project Film and Lecture Series.

When: Tuesday, May 14, 2013
Where: Aquarium of the Bay’s Bay Theatre
Tickets: http://hop514.eventbrite.com/

*Tickets are free, but required for entry. Reserve yours now!

The_other_side_of_the_ice_ACHOP_Invite

Marine Protected Areas (MPAs)

ACHOP Goal:  Increase public awareness and understanding of marine protected areas generally.  Also, to generate support for the expansion of Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary; AND the new network of marine protected areas that have been established pursuant to the California Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA).

Action: Support MPAs, by learning about them and asking your elected representatives to fund their implementation.  MPAs are:

  • Special places in the ocean where marine life can be protected for future generations
  • Like underwater parks similar to National Parks on land
  • Important areas for big, productive female fish to grow and have lots of babies
  • Unique ocean habitats people can visit and enjoy

Sustainable Seafood

ACHOP Goal: Increase public awareness and understanding of what sustainable seafood means and how to find it; and encourage everyone who eats seafood to choose wisely for the sake of ocean and their own health.

Action: Choose sustainable seafood, which is:

  • Caught or farmed in “ocean-friendly” ways – two of the key considerations being where and how the seafood was fished or farmed
  • Made up of a variety of seafood choices that are clearly identified in materials produced by the Monterey Bay Seafood Watch program and the SF Seafood Watch Alliance.
  • Delicious, locally available, and increasingly easy to find in restaurants and markets
  • Making a difference for improved ocean and human health

Ocean Trash/ Marine Debris

ACHOP Goal: Reduce plastic use and pollution through increased public awareness and understanding of how pervasive trash pollution – particularly single-use plastic debris – negatively impacts not only the environment, economy, and health of the San Francisco Bay Delta and all California residents, but also the global ocean and the planet itself.

Action: Keep trash out of the ocean.  Ocean trash is:

  • Extremely harmful to ocean health (particularly plastics), by injuring or killing over 200 different kinds of marine wildlife worldwide, disrupting ocean foodwebs, and negatively impacting human health
  • Used for a few minutes or hours, but (unless recycled) plastics exist on the planet for hundreds of years
  • Better left out of the watershed and ocean in the first place, rather than spending lots of money (in private and tax dollars) to clean it up
  • Mostly originating from land-based single-use plastic from individuals when simple solutions exist – like using reusable bottles and bags.

Healthy Ocean Project Outreach

For an overview of the 2012 Health Ocean Project outreach activities, click here.

Pledge Campaign.  We launched the “I Pledge” campaign this summer in coordination with our events to engage our fans and spectators around the Healthy Ocean Project.  Our goal is to get our audience to pledge to change one behavior – big or small – that benefits the ocean.  Thousands of people took the pledge at the event through online form and photo booth, and will launch the pledge online when new microsite goes live.  The idea is that changing one behavior now, adds up to a lifetime of change.  We had people pledge to buy fuel-efficient cars to saying “no” to plastic straws to promising to use their reusable coffee mugs to pledging to make sustainable choices when buying seafood.

Film and Lecture Series.  We established an America’s Cup Healthy Ocean Project Film and Lecture series and to date have held the following events at the Aquarium of the Bay Theater and at America’s Cup facilities:

  • Surfing Film Event with Grant Washburn, nationally known big wave surfer.
  • Ridding the Ocean of Plastics, Jean-Michel Cousteau and other speakers.
  • Saving the Ocean – Focus on Marine Protected Areas – Sylvia Earle
  • SHARKS:  Why we fear them and why we need them: The case for global conservation, John McCosker nationally known shark expert and other speakers.
  • More sessions are being planned for 2013.

Monthly Beach Clean-ups.  By the end of the year, we will have completed 8 beach clean-ups throughout San Francisco Bay with the advisory board organizations and America’s Cup team members.  We have engaged over 450 volunteers from the Bay area and continue to grow our team with every clean up.  We will continue to do monthly beach clean ups around the Bay area through September 2013.

ACHOP marine conservation partners full list (Global and Local Partners). Aquarium of the Bay; Mission Blue; Ocean Elders; One World One Ocean; IUCN; The Marine Mammal Center; Sailors for the Sea; Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary; Monterey Bay Aquarium; Save the Bay

For more information:  HOP@americascup.com

Global America’s Cup Healthy Ocean Partners

The America’s Cup is proud to be associated in these efforts with the following leading ocean conservation organisations:

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