I was sobered and appalled Sunday evening as I drove home from my feel-good training weekend as this NPR story played.

It is about a “patch” of the ocean filled with TRASH, 80% of which is plastic land waste.  (Best Life Magazine has a pretty in-depth article about the situation, in addition to the NPR story.)

And my first thought as I got upset was, “Why the hell didn’t I know about this before?” 

Why doesn’t EVERYONE know about this?

Which means, I’m going to tell you so that you can spread the word.  If this isn’t proof that something needs to change (which will be the next post on this topic), then what is?

The Facts:

• Refuse, both marine (20%) and land-based (80%), is collected in the pacific ocean between Hawaii and the West Coast by ocean currents.
• The Eastern Pacific Garbage Patch is nearly the size of two states of Texas.  TWO.  It is, in essence, a loose floating continent.
• It isn’t the only Garbage Patch in the Pacific
• Plastic doesn’t degrade.  It merely breaks into small bits (called “nurdles”) and is ingested or becomes a home for microorganisms, some of them harmful. 
• Some of this trash comes from ships that illegally jettison trash of corporations (botched shoe batches, plastic bags, etc).
• Accidental “dumps” of goods by ships are not required to be cleaned up or even reported.
• Wildlife eat the plastic items, thinking they are food.  Seabirds often ingest the plastic items, and then regurgitate it (or try to) for their chicks!  Other wildlife are caught in the plastic and die, or it becomes a permanent part of their lives.
• Japanese researchers found that “plastic debris can act like a sponge for toxic chemicals, soaking up a millionfold greater concentration of such deadly compounds as pcbs and dde, a breakdown product of the notorious insecticide ddt, than the surrounding seawater.” (from mindfully.org)
• Charles Moore is one of the few trying to make a difference in this situation.  This is a write up by him.

This doesn’t include the information we are continually learning about plastics and how harmful they are to us.  The chemicals involved with plastics have been linked to the obesity epidemic, as well as being found as carcinogens (remember my post about microwave popcorn?)

Part of the problem is no one group will claim responsibility for the problems - because it is everyone’s problem.  The US Government has taken some actions in working towards this, but it has been poorly funded and slow going.

The next post on this?  Continent of Trash - the 911.

Links for more information:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/10/19/SS6JS8RH0.DTL

http://www.algalita.org/newsletters.html

http://www.mindfully.org/Plastic/Ocean/Trashing-Oceans-Plastic4nov02.htm

http://www.mindfully.org/Plastic/Ocean/Pacific-Garbage-Patch27oct02.htm

http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/CrisesArticle.aspx?storyId=N05174536

http://marine-litter.gpa.unep.org/documents/World’s_largest_landfill.pdf

http://www.naturalhistorymag.com/master.html?http://www.naturalhistorymag.com/1103/1103_feature.html

http://www.bestlifeonline.com/cms/publish/health-fitness/Our_oceans_are_turning_into_plastic_are_we_2.shtml

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/pacificnw04232006/coverstory.html

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2007/10/19/SS6JS8RH0.DTL&type=politics

http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/1011/p02s01-usgn.html