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| (source: media.greenpeace.org) |
You’ll never guess what they found inside this whale…
Click to see what washed up on this remote island!
Shocking video of intelligent plastic lifeforms in the deep ocean!
OK, so the last one may be a little far-fetched, but it
seems ever more common nowadays to look through social media and be greeted
with striking news stories about oceanic plastic pollution, or obscene images
of the insides of a dead marine animal full of crisp packets, fishing nets,
bottle caps or even the head of a Barbie doll. We often hear facts like (for example in this report) the
equivalent of one rubbish truck worth of plastic is emptied into our oceans
each minute (8 million tons per year), or there
are large floating ‘garbage patches’ in the 5 subtropical gyres and between the 1970’s and 2010, the production of plastic per year
had increased by 5 times which is sure to increase further
if we stick to business as usual.
Literature and the media are filled with these sobering
facts, but it seems, despite the great work being done by many organisations
such as The Ocean Cleanup, eXXpedition and Project AWARE, as if a lot of the general
public are taking their time to act on oceanic plastic pollution.
Prior to studying for my MSc in Climate Change here at UCL,
I lived for over 2 years in Barcelona, a city with a plethora of beaches.
However, upon swimming in the ocean, it quickly became clear the extent of the floating
debris. Sometimes you would try to remove a plastic bag that you swam past,
only to see another one blowing in further down the beach. For me these moments
were infuriating, seeing many of these beach-goers not care about the
environment they seemed to love so much.
In this blog I hope to clearly outline the problem of oceanic
plastic pollution, to critique the potential solutions currently being put
forward and to hopefully generate a discussion on this topic with you, the
reader.
Tell me, what comes to mind when you think of oceanic
plastic pollution?
Really interesting topic, excited for the rest of the posts! I read that it's by 2050 there could be more plastic than fish in our oceans so interested to see what solutions are being put forward
ReplyDeleteThat's a horrifying fact! I would not like to see that become reality!
DeleteI wish plastic was only a drop in the ocean. It makes me quite sick knowing it's more like 5.2 trillion drops (Eriksen, 2014)... (having studied plastic in surface water as part of my undergraduate design project.)
ReplyDeleteIt actually surprised me to learn that plastic production has only quintuple since 1970 (based on how much plastic we consume, I would have guessed it to be more).
At the same time, I read in National Geographic that only 9% of plastic is recycled - so I won't give us a pat on the back for 'only' quintupling production... since virgin plastic production may be completely unnecessary if only we recycled.
Studying waste management in 2011, I realized that plastic is a complex material to recycle because of the different types. Then, I stumbled upon a needle in the hay stack (which is why I'm sharing now) of Michael Biddle and his engineered process to (for the first time ever) separate and recycle all types of mixed plastics. (check it out: http://www.mbapolymers.com/ (The videos are great)). After learning about MBA Polymer, my view of plastic recycling changed - I gained hope that it's possible. And, at the same time, it solidified that the littering, dumping, or burning of plastic is unnecessary and inexcusable... that poor whale.
I'm looking forward to reading more!
Yeah the facts I've seen about the amount of recycled plastic that has been reused on a commercial level is terrible. Major drink companies such as Coke say that their customers don't want to see plastic bottles with too much recycled material in it because it reduces its clarity. Personally I wouldn't mind in the slightest, I think it's a bit of a cop out on Coke's part.
DeleteMBA Polymers looks like a very forward thinking company, I had never heard of them before, I'll be sure to do some more research into their methods and perhaps even feature them later on in my blog!