The Big Pacific Plastic Patch
By Karina | November 30, 2009
If you’ve been reading Tiny Choices for a fair amount of time, you may have noticed that Jenn and I have different reasons for doing the same stuff. Reducing plastics in our lives is one of those issues - we have different reasons for wanting to reduce the amount of plastic that moves through our lives, but we both reduce nonetheless. On the subject of plastic, however, there’s one perfect shining example of why it needs reduction - and that is the giant swirling patch of garbage hanging out in the Pacific Ocean, stagnating away. We both agree that it is totally totally nasty! Here’s a good description of it:
Light bulbs, bottle caps, toothbrushes, Popsicle sticks and tiny pieces of plastic, each the size of a grain of rice, inhabit the Pacific garbage patch, an area of widely dispersed trash that doubles in size every decade and is now believed to be roughly twice the size of Texas.
I thought we’d written all about it, but when I went back to our archives there wasn’t much at all - Jenn described the gyre in this recent post, but after having sent an email to all of my loved ones back in April 2007 full of gruesome links, I guess I never got around to posting about it on Tiny Choices after we launched a few months later. (For more background check here and here.) So while I’m certainly not happy the gyre is still around, the recent NYTimes article about it is an excellent opportunity to post about it here.
It turns out that not only is the patch getting much larger much quicker, but it’s also (thankfully!) the subject of lots of scientific investigations recently - including some research on how to collect these plastics and potentially remanufacture them into diesel fuel. That would be great - what a great program with implications on removing the awful blight that we’ve caused through poor plastics management.
So, what’s the big deal, other than the fact that it’s gross and ugly? Well, there are several chemicals - DDT and dioxins, to start with - which are hydrophobic (i.e., don’t dissolve well in water) but absorb easily into plastic and fats. When the contaminated plastics hit the ocean and begin to break apart, the smaller pieces of plastic are consumed by small organisms and fish where they’re absorbed into the body fat of the fish. Then when these are eaten by bigger fish, and eventually up into larger animals, sea birds, and even humans, these these toxins are bioaccumulative, so the concentration of bad stuff grows larger the farther up the food chain you go. It’s not good for anyone, and it’s especially not good for those at the end of the food chain who receive a larger does of bad stuff.
If anyone asks me why I don’t like to buy new plastics, one of the first reasons I give is that it’s not an efficient use of a limited resource (the hydrocarbons used to make the plastics - as well as most fuels used around the world). But another reason that I should mention more is the plastic garbage patch in the Pacific. Trash makes it way there from around the world - from flyaways from garbage barges to floaters that come out of trash cans or recycling bins and go into storm sewers. There’s no way of controlling the appropriate disposal or recycling of anything that leaves our hands, and plastics are one of those things that I’d just rather avoid worrying about the end-route to where-ever. I don’t need to stress over if my recycling is going to end up in a factory or in the Pacific ocean. It’s much easier to avoid that entirely.
What’s your reason for reducing plastics? Any thoughts on the Plastic Gyre?
[[Photo from the NYTimes article about the garbage patch. Credit: Lindsey Hoshaw for The New York Times]]
Related posts:
- More Thoughts On Plastic Trash Bags…
- Cruising the World on a Plastic Boat
- “Help me stop using plastic bags”
- Tiny Choices Q&A: Tossing Trash when you’re Bag Free?
- My New Flame: A Vintage Zippo Lighter
- DIY: Crocheted Plastic Objects
- Travel Utensils; Or: How I Beat the Plastic Spoon.
Topics: Waste |
Yes, my thoughts on the plastic gyre are that it’s terrifying. Really. As I mentioned in my reusable-lighter post, when I checked out the photos Chris Jordan took in the area of the gyre, I was astonished to see disposable lighters in the bellies of dead sea birds. Also identifiable among all of the random plastic bits in their stomachs were plastic soda-bottle caps. This is just astonishing… it’s so clearly our fault that these birds are eating plastic, thinking it’s food. And by “our” I mean “all of our.” So, yea– we have so many reasons to reduce our plastic usage… this is just another one, albeit another VERY good one.
Oh man, Jenn, I felt tears welling in my eyes from seeing those pictures of those poor albatross chicks. 2000 miles from a continent and yet the trash is ubiquitous. So sad, but so important to see and know. Thank you for sharing that.
I do try to reduce my use of plastic as much as possible. I carry my tote and re-use any incidental bags for dirty kitty litter. I have been modifying my home routines to use fewer products with less packaging - solid bars of soap, baking soda/vinegar for my hair and much of the household cleaning, skipping unnecessary products whenever possible. I have reusable water bottles at home and work.
I really need to dump my juice habit because my fridge can only hold the single-use containers and the kind that I get are all plastic. It just isn’t worth it. I only get the juice as an occasional treat anyway, so it is better to get rid of it altogether.
I have multiple reasons for each of those decisions, but the idea of a plastic mass larger than the state of Texas is definitely a factor. I need to start talking about that to people again, especially my veg*n friends.