The once famously stated, “There’s a great future in plastics” clearly has come to haunt our environment, both land and ocean. The “Great Pacific Garbage Swirl” aka the “Garbage Patch” is living proof and is fed from just about everywhere, Hawai‘i, the mainland, other countries bordering the Pacific and ships at sea. Plastic in the environment is out of control. (This isn’t the only ocean “garbage patch” in the world.)
Never heard of the Great Pacific Garbage Swirl? Take a few minutes and watch this video. It’s an eye opener. And keep in mind that the old adage “out of sight, out of mind” won’t work here. The breakdown of all this garbage is finding it’s way back to our beaches and in the fish on our dinner tables, aside from the fact that it is killing ocean life.
This video was produced by the Algalita Marine Research Foundation. You can learn more about them at www.algalita.org.
So how do we tackle this problem? There are two central issues, first, don’t keep adding to the problem. Second, clean up the mess.
Not adding to the problem comes down to individual responsibility, first, and world-wide initiatives second. Individual responsibility means you, and me, changing our approach. Refuse plastic bags from stores (take your own bag) and faithfully recycle all the other plastics you just can’t avoid acquiring. If you have to use a plastic bag, recycle it. And make sure the trash haulers aren’t scattering debris as they haul garbage down the roads. Don’t throw stuff in the gutter. Enforce anti-littering laws.
Legislative action, now that is a complex issue. 20% of plastic garbage is said to come from ships. International laws banning the throwing of garbage overboard is a start. Probably more symbolic than anything, but it is said that cruise lines are starting to get on board…pun intended! Community bans of plastic bags are underway, but this needs to speed up and spread. Encourage industry to find ways to not use non-recyclable plastics, especially in consumer products.
Increase spending and effort on the development of bio-degradable plastics — bioplastic. Decrease the use of plastics! Now there is a concept. Look at all the useless junk plastic is turned into.
Cleaning up the mess is a bit daunting. It has been said that there is no way to clean up what is there, we can only not add to it. The “patch” is simply too big and is estimated to be bigger than the state of Texas and up to 90 feet thick in places, weighing some 3,500 tons and growing.
Since something like 80% of the garbage in the ocean comes from land sources, it seems logical to suggest that most of that 80% comes down fresh water streams and rivers. Where are the major culprits? What can be done to increase the efforts of the cities and towns along these waterways to clean up their act? If you haven’t paid attention to where the storm drain on your street goes, now is the time. Many empty directly to local waterways which empty into bigger waterways which eventually empty into the ocean. This is how the trash on your street adds to the Great Pacific Garbage Swirl!
As daunting as this problem may seem, the easiest and most effective solution is for individual’s to not add to the problem. Avoid plastic bags and recycle all the other plastics. To quote another famously made statement with great applicability here, “Just Do It!
THIS SAD TALE CONTINUES
Now that we know the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is out there, and that it consists mostly of plastics (about 90%), and that 80% of the stuff comes from land and 20% from ships and oil platforms, the next question is where does it end up and what is it doing to the environment?
The simple answer to where it ends up is it ends up everywhere. As the great pot of soup swirls, the plastics, which do not biodegrade, break down into ever smaller pieces. These pieces at certain sizes and colors look like food to many sea critters. Confusion with plankton is a huge issue. As the pieces breakdown even smaller, they eventually find their way into the ocean currents and out of the patch they go. The beaches of Hawai‘i are right on their path of movement as well as all beaches of the Pacific, spreading not only their physical self but also the chemicals within their composition. Lots of nasty stuff the scientists say.
Marcus Eriksen, PhD, the Director of Education at the Algalita Marine Research Foundation, is quoted in an article on the UK-based “The Independent” website,
Dr Eriksen said the slowly rotating mass of rubbish-laden water poses a risk to human health, too. Hundreds of millions of tiny plastic pellets, or nurdles – the raw materials for the plastic industry – are lost or spilled every year, working their way into the sea. These pollutants act as chemical sponges attracting man-made chemicals such as hydrocarbons and the pesticide DDT. They then enter the food chain. “What goes into the ocean goes into these animals and onto your dinner plate. It’s that simple,” said Dr Eriksen.
The result is all negative. Embedded in the fish we eat, these chemicals come back to us. It’s estimated that a million seabirds and about 100,000 sea mammals die annually due to this ocean trash. Here’s a rather interesting video in support of this sad tale.
This video above and the next one were produced by Shifting Baselines. You can learn more about them at www.shiftingbaselines.org.
Here’s another that is just too funny to pass up.
So think about what you can do to help not add to the problem. Recycle, reuse or just don’t buy it in the first place!
KEEPING IT FROM GETTING IN THE OCEAN
Every bit of debris came from somewhere, land, ships and occasionally from space in the form of a crashing satellite, but studies suggest land is the major source, around 80%. How trash gets from your community to the ocean is not a difficult to follow path. What lands along roadsides and goes in gutters often ends up in local waterways. Local waterways carry this stuff to regional waterways. Regional waterways terminate at the ocean. Ocean currents then take over and off the plastic bottles, cigarette filters, plastic toys, etc., etc., etc. go on their path of circulation heading to the Pacific Gyre and the swirling garbage patch.
Clearly, the solution to “not adding more to the problem” starts in your neighborhood. And you don’t have to be in a coastal community. You could be in the upper Midwest where your local/regional waterways connect to the Mississippi River. Or in Idaho where your local/regional waterways connect to the Columbia River. Your trash can easily end up in the Gulf of Mexico or off the coast of Oregon and Washington. So don’t think a 500 or 1,500 mile distance from the ocean makes you not part of the problem! And don’t think living in the Hawaiian Archipelago don’t make a contribution to the swirl. It bears repeating, “Recycle, Reuse or just don’t buy it in the first place!
GETTING IT OUT OF THE OCEAN
This is the big one. Short of some Star Wars approach of zapping this stuff from a space-based laser and vaporizing the trash, there will have to be a more practical means of cleanup. It appears that the first serious attempt to try something is coming from an organization called Project Kaisei. This project is being masterminded by a worldwide, multidisciplinary team of six with an advisory board of four, including involvement of National Geographic. Here is a quote from their mission statement that pretty clearly states their intent:
“Project Kaisei consists of a team of innovators, ocean lovers, sailors, scientists, sports enthusiasts and environmentalists who have come together with a common purpose. To study how to capture plastic waste in the ocean and how to capture, detoxify and recycle it into diesel fuel. This first research Mission, scheduled for the summer of 2009, will be critical to understanding the logistics that will be needed to make a successful clean-up operation possible as some of the technology required for such a feat has never been utilised under oceanic conditions.”
To learn more about Project Kaisei, click this link to their website. We certainly wish them luck in their test project this summer.
