Everyone knows on some level that plastic is bad for the environment because it doesn’t decompose, but most people aren’t aware of the extent of it’s damage. Plastic bags in particular are notorious for ending up in the stomachs of sea turtles. This is because these bags closely resemble jellyfish (a staple of many sea turtle species’ diets) as they drift through ocean currents. Straws, mesh, packaging, and plastic fishing gear are also responsible for killing or injuring sea turtles, and in this way, the turtles have almost become a martyr symbol for the benefit of anti-bag arguments.
But there are millions of other species affected by plastics in the oceans, and several other effects that tend to go unnoticed by the public. Plastics realistically cannot decompose because they are not made of organic compounds. They can only break down into smaller and smaller pieces. We don’t actually know how long it would really take for plastic to “decompose”, but some estimates are around more than 1,000 years. But back to the breakdown, researchers in the Northern Atlantic have found that 93% of the plastic they recover from below-surface collections are in pieces smaller than the size of a penny. As these pieces of plastic get smaller and smaller, they can lead to a huge problem called biomagnification. This occurs when a pollutant gets more and more concentrated the farther up a food chain it goes. For example, if a minnow eats one piece of plastic, and a larger fish eats three minnows, it now has three pieces of plastic in its belly. If a bird eats ten of these larger fish in one day, it now has thirty pieces of plastic in its belly. This plastic quickly piles up, leading to blocked digestive systems or suffocation, poisoning, and eventual death.
Plastic bags in particular cause another problem due to their shape and density: the transfer of pollutants and invasive species across vast distances. Plastic bags float for a while, but even after they sink, they are still easily carried along by water currents. Were it easy to trace them, plastic bags from America could easily be found on the coasts of nearly every continent in the world. Plastic bags, as relatively flat and solid surfaces, make the perfect vessel for small crustaceans and parasites to latch onto until they find a new host. On plastic bags they can cross entire oceans to infest new regions in a matter of weeks. This puts entire ecosystems at risk should these invaders be successful. In the same manner, pollutants have been found to bind to plastic bags and travel across large distances in the same way.
Now, you’re probably at that point where your stomach is turning with unease and you’re wondering if anyone is actually trying to fix some of these issues. The answer is always yes, because where there is a problem in this world, there are always good people trying to help. However, the sheer magnitude of the amount of plastic in the ocean is so staggering that manual clean ups will never be able to solve it. Statistically, somewhere between 5.3 to 14 million tons of plastic are dumped into the oceans every year. Every. Year. To put this into perspective, an article by the Natural Resources Defense Council stated this to be equivalent of “stacking five grocery bags full of plastic on every foot of coastline in the world” (Palmer, 2015). So how do we try to clean up what we find in an efficient manner? We invent the technology to do it for us, and we get legislation in line to allow it. Take a look at this cool invention designed by a pair of Australian surfer bros. It’s compact, efficient, and can go on any oceanside dock anywhere in the world.
But with all this plastic going into the oceans, we’re going to need more than dockside bins. Let’s go bigger.
Do not lose hope. The good people of the world are still standing up for what they believe in, and for what we all know is right. And best of all, they are using the very best science and technology to do it. But we are at war with our fellow man, and when people only keep their own self-interests close, progress is put on hold. Whose interests will you prioritize? What could you do to fix a problem that is deeply embedded in our culture that we now must eradicate? What can you do? That’s why I’m here.
Sources:
- February 12, 2015 Brian Palmer. (2016, December 20). The Blue (Plastic) Planet. Retrieved April 21, 2017, from https://www.nrdc.org/onearth/blue-plastic-planet
- MOORE, C., & Phillips, C. (2012). Plastic ocean: How a sea captain’s chance discovery launched a determined quest to save the ocean. New York: Avery pub Group.
- -Ferguson, S., Law, K. L., Proskurowski, G., Murphy, E. K., Peacock, E. E., & Reddy, C.M. (2010). The size, mass, and composition of plastic debris in the western North Atlantic Ocean. Marine Pollution Bulletin,60(10), 1873-1878. doi:10.1016/j.marpolbul.2010.07.020
Plastic or More Plastic? 