The Great Pacific Garbage Patch may be cleaned up sooner than previously thought, thanks to new developments from Dutch scientists.

The Ocean Cleanup has announced it will begin removing plastic from the floating patch of marine debris in the North Pacific Ocean next year, according to a release. It has increased the efficiency of its ocean-cleaning technologies and their models suggest they can have half of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch cleaned up in just five years. 

Boyan Slat, 22, launched the foundation after a run in with marine debris. 

“When I was 16 years old, I was diving in Greece and I realized I came across more plastic bags than fish,” Slat told WBUR. “That for me started this mission to invent a structure that could actually clean this up.”

(MORE: More Massive Plastic Garbage Patches Found, This Time in the Arctic Ocean)

The Great Marine Garbage Patch, also known as the Pacific trash vortex, stretches from the West Coast to Japan. Because the plastics forming the patches are so small, they’re often undetectable to the naked eye and simply make the water look cloudy and soupy, according to National Geographic.

These plastics are typically microbeads, tiny bits of plastic smaller than 5 mm that can be found in our toothpastes, face washes, soaps and cleaning products. Researchers estimate that 8 trillion microbeads are being released into aquatic habitats in the U.S. per day.

In order to clean up the trash vortex, the foundation’s scientists say they will place various U-shaped screens into the water and allow the ocean currents to do the work and push plastic into a central point, states the release. Once caught in the screen, the plastic can be removed and taken to shore for recycling. 

The screens will be secured with anchors that make sure they’re moving slower than the plastics they’re trying to collect. 

The Ocean Cleanup will begin testing its first system against the patch at the end of this year before launching the first official deployment in the first half of 2018, two years ahead of schedule, according to the release.

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