Over 1000 volunteers helped pull nearly 4000 tonnes of trash from Lake Geneva in the 8th annual ‘Net’Leman’ event sponsored by Association to Preserve Lake Geneva. A dozen sites, on both the Swiss and French sides of the lake took part.
The event’s name is from “Nettoyer Leman,” French for cleanup of the lake whose name in French is Leman. Most of the volunteers collected on-shore, but 240 were diver who went into the water for average 50-minutes stints.
As organizer expected, the largest amount was collected near urban areas, but they also emphasized that the problem starts far from the lake; much of the rubbish is brought to the lake by the rivers that feed it.
Divers removed large quantities of junk near jetties including shopping trolleys, bikes, scooters, batteries and tires. Those on the shore picked up large amounts of plastic, cans, glass bottles, caps and cigarette butts.
