The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

In the National Geographic article “Eight Million Tons of Plastic Dumped in Ocean Every Year”, author Laura Parker expresses how violent the simple act of dumping trash into the ocean really turns out to be. This article goes into depth telling exactly what plastics pollution is causing, where it’s mostly coming from, and what you can do to decrease this problem and help save both our planet and ocean wildlife.

Everybody throws away trash with little or no thought about where it’s going. What you might not know is that a lot of trash goes into our ocean. You may think it is not a big deal and that it’s just a little bit of trash in a really big ocean, but it’s not just a little bit of trash. In fact, it’s a whole lot. There is a place between California and Hawaii called the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre, but is better known as the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch”. This area is the largest landfill in the world and is completely in the ocean. What are the effects of the landfill on the environment and how can it be prevented and rehabilitated to its original state?

Today, scientists believe the world's largest garbage dump isn't on land but it is in the

More than 750,000 pieces of microplastic can be found in just one square kilometer of it. Approximately 80 percent of its debris comes from land, 10 percent is made up of over 700,000 tons of commercial fishing nets, and the remaining 10 percent consists miscellaneous objects discarded by recreational and commercial ships. What is it? The Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The garbage patch lies in the Pacific Ocean between the west coasts of America and the East coasts of Asia. Because the effects on marine life caused by the Great Pacific Garbage Patch are detrimental to their habitat, diet, and

In the article When the Mermaids Cry” The Great Plastic Tide by Claire Le Guern Lytle, she wrote “For more than 50 years, global production and consumption of plastics have continued to rise. An estimated 299 million tons of plastics were produced in 2013, representing a 4 percent increase over 2012, and confirming and upward trend over the past years” This means that more and more trash is added to the 5.25 trillion pieces of plastic floating in the ocean. Almost everything around us is made out of plastic, this is later misused and ending in the wrong place. The Center for Biological Diversity wrote “In the first decade of this century, we made more plastic than all the plastic in history up to the year 2000. And every year, billions of pounds of plastic end up in the world’s oceans. Most ocean pollution starts out on land and is carried by wind and rain to the sea. Once in the water, there is a near-continuous accumulation of waste.” Our plastic is misplaced and it escalates from there. However, plastic pollution hurts us as well. “Trash in the water compromises the health of humans, wildlife and the livelihoods that depend on a healthy ocean;” wrote a non-profit group called Ocean Conservation. If our oceans are covered in trash, everyone that relies on the ocean is going to suffer. The effect is not just in our health, it also affects our economy. Ocean Conservation also

Marine debris is more than ugly, it kills. There are two proposed plans to cleanup the North Pacific Garbage Island. An island that is made of garbage, primarily plastic. It is over 100 kilometers wide. That is an unbelievable amount of trash. That trash island is floating in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, between Hawaii and California. It has been spun together over time by currents, and the atmospheric pressure in the middle of the ocean is stronger than average. The island’s plastic has melted together, creating a bed of plastic for the rest of the trash to lie on. A a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a

From the polar regions to the equator, these microplastics are everywhere (Avio, 2017). While we know there are tons of plastic in the ocean, it is difficult for researchers to give an exact amount. However, after twenty-four expeditions, a team of researchers in 2014 estimated that there are at least 5.25 trillion plastic particles weighing 268,940 tons floating in the ocean (Eriksen, 2014). They estimate that the North Pacific and North Atlantic oceans contain 55.6% of the particles found in the oceans (Eriksen, 2014). These researchers have helped give emphasis and proof as to why the worlds plastic consumption needs to be dealt with, either by banning non-biodegradable plastic all together, or by providing people all around the world with an easier way to recycle plastic.

Plastic comes in innumerable shapes and sizes; it is used for various purposes. We use it to bag our groceries, pay with it, drink from it, occasionally eat off it or unwrap it to get to food, etc. The functionality of plastic is continual and surrounds us, so what is the con of plastic? When plastic cups, bottles, and bags are abandoned in the street, the wind transports and the rain seizes them into storm gutters, tributaries and eventually the ocean. When rubbish and plastic originate from terrestrial territory and enters the sea it is swept away by an eddy vortex called the North Pacific Gyre. Charles Moore discovered the North Pacific Gyre, or also known as “The Great Pacific Garbage Patch” in 1997. This garbage patch stretches hundreds of miles off the shoreline of California and Hawaii. Scientists estimated its size to be twofold the size of Texas or maybe even more substantial. This garbage patch contains some ten million tons of litter. According to Lindsey Blomberg, who wrote the article titled The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, writes, “What is known for certain is that the marine debris in the North Pacific Gyre is 80% plastic and it's mostly coming from land.” (1) Although the trash is in the ocean, it not only affects us but, wildlife on land or in sea too. Furthermost of the waste in the ocean consists of "microplastics" which according to Kitt Doucette, who wrote the article titled An Ocean Of Plastic is, “Larger chunks of waste that have been reduced to tiny

A large number of marine species are known to be harmed and/or killed by plastic debris, which jeopardize their survival, since many are already endangered by other forms of anthropogenic activities. Marine animals are affected through entanglement in and ingestion of plastic litter (Marine Debris). Less conspicuous forms, such as plastic pellets and “scrubbers” are also hazardous. To address the problem of plastic debris in the oceans is a difficult task, and a variety of approaches are required. According to research conducted by the National Academy of Sciences, 14 billion pounds of trash is dumped into the ocean each year. That is more than 38 million pounds a day. More than 85% of all the trash that is dumped comes from the world’s merchant shipping fleet. According to the same research, the United States is responsible for an estimated one- third of all the trash that is dumped into the ocean (Amaral). The reason this is still going on is because the majority of the trash that is dumped is in international waters. United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea that convened in 1982 defines territorial waters and international waters as: territorial waters are waters extending up to 12 nautical miles from a coastal state, and they are considered to be within the jurisdiction of that particular state or ‘territorial waters’ If oceans, seas, rivers or lakes extend beyond international boundaries and are not territorial waters, they are classed as

According to Oceana, the agency in charge of protecting the world’s oceans, the number one pollutant in the North Pacific Gyre is still plastic. Oceana remains unsure of the quantity of plastic in the water. Our “need” for plastic has harmed innocent little creatures and ourselves as well when we should be searching for safer alternatives instead.

Some people call the Pacific Garbage patch The Floating Island Of Trash. Well, it is trash, but not exactly an island like some people think-- It is more like trash soup located near Midway Island/Atoll. Midway is one third of the distance from Honolulu, Hawaii to Tokyo, Japan. Scientists estimate that it is now the size of America! This garbage patch is a collection of marine debris that is mostly made out of plastic. The debris collects in the pacific garbage patch due to a series of currents that create a circular effect like a toilet bowl and a spiral. These currents are called the gyres;the trash and debris gets trapped. Most of the trash is under the water, and much of it is so small you can not see it. NOAA, the National Oceanic Atmospheric Association reported that," In 2008 plastic outweighs surface zooplankton 6 to 1." The garbage in Pacific Gyre is mainly plastic. There are plastic bottles, plastic caps, plastic computer parts just to name a few. There is not only one gyre in the ocean, there are 5. We have so much plastic that we should not be using. This plastic is effecting the ocean, animals, people, and our

Plastic is a huge problem to the Earth’s ecosystem, including to the marine wildlife of the oceans. It gets into our oceans in large quantities, and they pile up to a point they become an “island of plastic.” Some of which are estimated to be as big as a few million square miles, the biggest being in the Pacific ocean. This could result in environmental issues that could harm the ecosystems of the oceans. It would be eaten in small quantities by fish and by birds, which could cause many health problems that could lead to death. This is a problem that will only lead us to think more critically the waste we produce as humans. In only of a short time span of 35 years, was the oceans transformed into a landfill of plastic.

In the documentary “Inside the Garbage of the World”, the main social problem being explained is that there has been a great influx of plastic and other type of garbage in oceans and their beaches. This buildup of pollution has largely affected the wildlife population ranging from animals on the beaches to the creatures of the ocean. In oceans, what is called ‘garbage patches’, a large buildup of garbage that flow to one area in the oceans, are being created. Approximately 50 percent of all plastic sinks to the bottom of the ocean floor but about 2 times that much is actually already on the ocean floor. In fact, according to the documentary, there is a garbage patch that is to the left of California that is the size of half of the United States. Each year, about 4.7 million tons of plastic goes in the ocean a year and it is estimated that by 2050, there will be another 33 billion tons of plastic added to the present amount. Eighty percent of the current pollution comes from the land. According to marine researchers, twice as much plastic debris is one the ocean floor than it was 10 years ago. In the futures, plastic will break down into smaller pieces of plastic, creating a bigger problem from the habitat. This plastic pollution is one of the leading cause for beach and ocean inhabiting creatures be extinct because animals are mistaking these plastic pieces for food. When scientist began to dissect beach animals such as birds, they discovered that at least fifteen pounds of

of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, the exact size remains unknown. In addition, Doucette warns us that this patch contains more than ten million tons of waste. She describes the area to be a “fetid swamp of debris where tiny bits of decaying plastic outweigh zooplankton- one of the most prolific and abundant organisms on the planet- by a ration of six-to-one”(Doucette). It is now apparent that the amount of plastic particles residing in our oceans is damaging the natural habit and this trash is not going anywhere. Due to the currents in the ocean, plastic particles are

Where does all the plastic go. Every bit of plastic that has been created is still here. This is because plastic is one-hundred percent non-biodegradable! Even the most degraded plastic down to polymers cannot be digested by bacteria (Laist, 1997). If global issues like starvation and climate change are not enough to stress on, the weight of an issue literally churning in the Pacific Ocean is startling. For decades the majority of the world’s population has not been properly educated on the nature of plastic and the potential harm it can do to our environment and our physical health. Due to factors of man and the natural effects of nature, a major problem has developed that is now harming our food.