In 1979, Roger Payne said that pollution would replace the harpoon as the greatest threat to whales, and in more recent years much of Ocean Alliance's work has been directed towards combating this growing threat. From 2000–2005, under the leadership of Iain Kerr, Ocean Alliance launched the Voyage of the Odyssey, which provided the first ever global data set on pollution in the oceans. This project lasted five years and spanned the entire planet. In the executive summary of the program, Roger Payne states that, "The Voyage of the Odyssey has proven irrefutably that ocean life is becoming polluted to unacceptable levels by metals and human-made contaminants."