Have you been reading my mind Al?
Today’s article is the continuation of yesterday’s write and the subject is just that: This huge monstrosity of plastic debris twice the size of Texas that is created from six million tonnes of discarded plastic! When I read the article I was flabbergasted. How could we have such a major disruption in our ecosystem and not have it be on the news every night. Thankfully, it was on Oprah, which I didn’t see, but everyone needs to be aware just how bad plastic is, and in my mind, taking over our beloved planet. More has to be done to stop this ever growing plastic island that is floating in the middle of the North Pacific.
And you’re right Al. Not only about the food that we consume, but about our medical system. Every time I give blood, I look around at all of the plastic being used and many of it just once and thrown away. I always have visions of that movie ‘Sex, Lives and Videotapes’, where the actor Andie McDowell is talking to her therapist and her biggest concern is where all of the garbage is going. I’m like her. I think about that same thing all of the time.
Anyways, back to subject: The floating isle of debris….
The toxic soup of refuse was discovered in 1997 when Charles Moore, an oceanographer, decided to travel through the centre of the North Pacific gyre (a vortex or circular ocean current). Navigators usually avoid oceanic gyres because persistent high-pressure systems — also known as the doldrums — lack the winds and currents to benefit sailors.
Mr Moore found bottle caps, plastic bags and polystyrene floating with tiny plastic chips. Worn down by sunlight and waves, discarded plastic disintegrates into smaller pieces. Suspended under the surface, these tiny fragments are invisible to ships and satellites trying to map the plastic continent, but in subsequent trawls Mr Moore discovered that the chips outnumbered plankton by six to one.
Is your jaw dropping? Are your eyes welling up with tears? Mine are. Read on…there’s more that will break your heart.
The damage caused by these tiny fragments is more insidious than strangulation, entrapment and choking by larger plastic refuse. The fragments act as sponges for heavy metals and pollutants until mistaken for food by small fish. The toxins then become more concentrated as they move up the food chain through larger fish, birds and marine mammals.
“You can buy certified organic farm produce, but no fishmonger on earth can sell you a certified organic wild-caught fish. This is our legacy,” said Mr Moore.
Because of their tiny size and the scale of the problem, he believes that nothing can be solved at sea. “Trying to clean up the Pacific gyre would bankrupt any country and kill wildlife in the nets as it went.”
We’ve been told to eat wild caught fish and that farmed fish is not as good because the farmed fish don’t have or build up the natural resistances to the environment that wild fish have. But what wild fish can stave off the toxic soup they’re swimming in and the heavy metals and pollutants that they are mistakenly eating? This saddens me to no end.
This month 151ft brigantine Kaisei (Japanese for Planet Ocean) will unfurl its sails in San Francisco to try to prove Mr Moore wrong. Project Kaisei’s flagship will be joined by a decommissioned fishing trawler armed with specialised nets. The goal is for the scientists and conservationists on the expedition to retrieve and recycle this plastic disaster. Is it possible and will retrieval do any good? Once again, we are dealing with the problem and not much is being done to prevent an even bigger island from being created from our throw-away plastic bottles and containers.
Here is the rest of the article:
“The trick is collecting the plastic while minimising the catch of sea life. We can’t catch the tiny pieces. But the net benefit of getting the rest out is very likely to be better than leaving it in,” says Doug Woodring, the leader of the project.
With a crew of 30, the expedition, supported by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography and Brita, the water company, will use unmanned aircraft and robotic surface explorers to map the extent and depth of the plastic continent while collecting 40 tonnes of the refuse for trial recycling.
“We have a few technologies that can turn thin plastics into diesel fuel. Other technologies are much more hardcore, to deal with the hard plastics,” says Mr Woodring, who hopes to run his vessels on the recycled fuel.
Plastics bags, food wrappers and containers are the second and third most common items in marine debris around the world, according to the Ocean Conservancy, which is based in Washington. The proportion of tiny fragments, known as mermaid’s tears, are less easily quantified.
The UN’s environmental programme estimates that 18,000 pieces of plastic have ended up in every square kilometre of the sea, totalling more than 100 million tonnes. The North Pacific gyre — officially called the northern subtropical convergence zone — is thought to contain the biggest concentration. Ideal conditions for shifting slicks of plastic also exist in the South Pacific, the Indian Ocean and the North and South Atlantic, but no research vessel has investigated those areas. If this exploratory mission is successful, a bigger fleet will depart in 2010.
Mr Woodring admits that Project Kaisei has limitations. “We won’t be able to clean up the entire ocean. The solution really lies on land. We have to treat plastics in a totally different way, and stop them ever reaching the ocean.”
Did you learn something about plastics? Is it not apparent that something major needs to be done?
I wish them luck. And I wish for everyone to consider what they buy when they go shopping and use less plastic. Or even better, If you love a product and know that the plastics they are using are not recyclable, e-mail them linking the article or write them and send them a print out of it. Their bottom line is no excuse anymore.
Thanks for reading.
Please do something.
We only have One Planet, One Earth.
~~~~~~~
Hi ZL: How are you? Sorry that I have not called. I am up to my eyeballs in paperwork these days. We’ll catch up soon.
Anna: I had to laugh at your comment to your Chamorros friends: “I do this out of love. It is not my job.” Oh, how many times I have said those same words in my mind to myself when I have felt that I have not been putting enough time into my morning blog. But then oops, I realize no one is demanding anything of me except myself. That’s when I tell myself to shut up and carry on. I’m doing what I can. By the way, you’re doing a great job committing yourself to writing here everyday too. Hafa Adai.
Curious Minds: That question came to my mind too. Hey TAO: Did you and/or Maddie ‘borrow’ that Brazilian plane and try to fool us with some phony debris? (Added 9:15am: Note: This is in no disrespect to those lives that were lost, nor to the families who have lost their loved ones.)
Hello Alexander: How are you? Thank you for the very interesting history lesson. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and I bet my readers did too. Please tell us more. It is a welcoming break from all that is being discussed on my blog.
Gratefully your blog host,
michelle
Aka BABE: Your Bad Ass Bitch Editor
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