According to local news report the communities of Naknek, Dillingham, Petersburg and Cordova received funding via the Pacific States Marine Fisheries Commission for two years to jump start net recycling projects. The project is said to be funded through pool of money that comes from the US Fish and Wildlife Foundation, which has committed $2 million to the ‘Fishing for Energy’ program over the next five years.
Kristin Smith, director of the Copper River Watershed Project, one of many recycling project partners in Cordova, opined that the main aim of this project is to find an alternative use for these mountains of web that otherwise go in its own landfills. It is informed that each community is in the process of hiring a net recycling coordinator, whose first task will be to set up convenient net drop off areas near local harbors.
Smith told that Alaska Marine Lines has agreed to contribute shipping and they are a key to the whole process. He further told because the economics are not there right not – there was a time when they would pay 12 cents a pound for old web, now it’s 4 cents.
Meanwhile, as Alaska’s recycling projects ramp up, Cordovans have already put old fishing nets to good use. The Watershed Project uses them to help surface a scenic 1,100 foot trail on the Cordova breakwater that is made up of big boulders, called riprap. Instead of paying for costly shot rock, the group got the idea to use gillnet web.
