VITALITY's goals are; work for social/ environmental justice, support all life, truth, peace, economic prosperity/equality, inform, educate (me included), and defend legal immigrants. Themes include; culture, spirituality, films, books, the environment, politics, etc. Italian: Gli obbiettivi e i temi di VITALITY sono; la giustizia sociale, dell'ambiente, la verita', la pace, prosperita', il rispetto e la protezione della vita, l'informazione, l'insegnamento, e l'emigrazione legale.
Monday, May 30, 2016
Saturday, May 21, 2016
WE ARE KILLING THE OCEANS WITH OUR THROW AWAY PLASTIC! In two generations we could kill the seas, unless we come to our senses and stop throwing plastic in the environment! If we want to survive we have no choice! However, we all must do our part! Italian:
Stiamo avvelenando gli oceani con la plastic, quella che si usa-e-butta! In due generazioni potremmo distruggere il mare, a meno che ci rimbocchiamo le mani! Usiamo il buon senso e la smettiamo d'inquinare e buttare plastica nell'ambiente! Se vogliamo sopravvivere non abbiamo altra scelta! Tutti dobbiamo fare la nostra parte!
This past week I was co-teaching in Mrs. Vissat's class. She is reading teacher, and was reading the book titled: "Plastiki". This non-fiction book tells the story of several men and a woman who sailed on Plastiki (a boat largely made of plastic bottles), from San Francisco, USA, to Sydney Australia. I was shocked to learn that there are huge islands of plastic in the middle of our oceans. Look at these images, read the transcript from NOAA, the National Ocean Service, and then watch the documentary: PLASTIC PARADISE. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, and see it for yourself. In the meantime I'll be taking action I'll be writing to Washington and NY State legislator and make them aware of this threat to out oceans. We must all cooperate and stop using plastics and/or at least recycle them instead of dumping them into the environment and cause irreparable harm to nature.
In this post you'll find the following info.: Facts about ocean plastic pollution from the National Geographic and NOAA, National Oceanic Administration, and way on how each one of us can help to save the oceans.
La settimana scorsa ho insegnato nella classe di quarta elementare della mia collega, l'insegnante di lettura, la signora Pat Vissat. Stavamo leggendo e discutendo un libro molto interessante e pieno di belle immagini sconvolgenti, dal titolo: "The Voyage of Plastiki" (Il Viaggio di Plastiki) . E' una storia vera di diversi uomini e alcune donne che hanno navigato su Plastiki (una barca in gran parte fatta di bottiglie di plastica). Hanno salpato (partito) da San Francisco, negli Stati Uniti d'America, e sono arrivati a Sydney in Australia, dopo un paio di mesi.
Io sapeva che l'inquinamento e' un gran problema, ma sono rimasto scioccato di vedere che ci sono enormi isole di plastica nel mezzo dei nostri oceani. Guardate le immagini, leggete la trascrizione dal NOAA, il Servizio Nazionale Americano degli Oceani, e poi guardare il documentario: PLASTICA PARADISE. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, e vedete/costatate di persona. Nel frattempo sara' importante reagire- fare qualcosa per proteggere i mari. Io ho gia' scritto a Washington e ai leaders dello Stato di New York, per passare quest'informazione- questa minaccia ai nostri oceani. Ma dobbiamo essere tutti collaborare e smettere di usare la plastica, rifiutarla quando si fanno e spese, e / o almeno reciclarla invece di scaricarla nell'immondizia- perche' poi va' a finire nell'ambiente (usalmente nel mare), e causa danni alla flora (piante) e alla fauna marina (i pesci e gli animal del mare). insomma la plastica causa danni irreparabili alla natura. E se continuiamo di questo passo, inquinando sempre di piu', sara' la nostra fine. In questo post /articolo troverete le seguenti informazioni. Fatti sull'inquinamento di plastica dell'oceano dal National Geographic e NOAA, National Oceanic Administration, e i modi in cui ognuno di noi può contribuire a salvare gli oceani.
This, below, is an award winning documentary by ANGELA SUN. Click on the link under the image, and then watch the whole movie- which received many awards. YOU CAN PURCHASE IT ON AMAZON- AS I DID FOR 12.99- Hopefully it will inspire you to do something to help save the ocean.
This is Making Waves from NOAA's National Ocean Service. I'm Troy Kitch. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch. I bet you've heard of it. It's a phrase that's really caught on in the past few years. And it's easy to see why: it conjures up a powerful image ... a vast vortex of human waste — plastic bags, tires, cans, barrels, you name it ... floating out there in the ocean. But here's the thing: it doesn't really look like that at all. What it looks like to the human eye, from satellites, is, for the most part, well ... not much at all. Most of it is all but invisible. How can that be?
Well, I recently sat down with Dianna Parker from the NOAA Marine Debris Program to find out what the garbage patch is and isn't, what we know and don't know, and what we can do about this ocean-sized problem. Dianna, welcome and thanks for joining us. Let's start with the obvious question: what are we talking about when we say 'garbage patch?' [Dianna Parker] “A lot of people hear the word patch and they immediately think of almost like a blanket of trash that can easily be scooped up, but actually these areas are always moving and changing with the currents, and it's mostly these tiny plastics that you can't immediately see with the naked eye."
I noticed that you said garbage patch 'areas.' So the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is only one area in the ocean where marine debris concentrates?
[Dianna Parker] "There are garbage patches all over the world. These are areas where debris naturally accumulates. So there are garbage patches of all different sizes and shapes and compositions. The one that we know the most about is the Great Pacific Garbage Patch which lies in an area between Hawaii and California. What we know about this area is that it's made up of tiny micro plastics, almost akin to a peppery soup, with scattered larger items, fishing gear, those kind of items swirling around."
A peppery soup? Could you explain that again?
[Dianna Parker] "Well, imagine tiny, tiny micro plastics just swirling around, mixing in the water column from waves and wind, that's always moving and changing with the currents. These are tiny plastics that you might not even see if you sailed through the middle of the garbage patch, they're so small and mixed throughout the water column."
I would think that most of the plastics that ends up in the ocean are bigger pieces ... like bags and bottles and plastic toys. But you're saying that most of the plastic is so small that's it's hard or impossible to see. Can you talk a little more about the plastic debris in the ocean ... why it's so small?
[Dianna Parker] "There are many different kinds of plastics out in the ocean and they come from a number of different sources. So, there are teeny, tiny micro plastics out there that were either manufactured to be small — for example, the microbeads in face wash can be plastic; there are also little, tiny plastic pellets that we sometimes call ‘'nurdles' that are used to make larger items but then there are also tiny plastics that are shards of larger items. Plastics never really go away. They just break down over and over and over again until they become smaller and smaller from sunlight and other environmental factors [like] waves, big storms, those kind of things."
So we have these vast regions in the ocean where the water column looks like a peppery soup because of all these small bits and pieces of plastic. I would imagine this plastic kind of looks like food. Do we know if fish and birds are eating this stuff?
[Dianna Parker] "We know that some species of birds and fish eat micro plastics. They even eat some larger plastics. So for example, the Laysan Albatross in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, we know that just about every dead albatross found on Midway Atoll has some form of plastic in its stomach. We don't know if that's what killed it, but we know that this is becoming a big problem. So we know that there are micro plastics in the ocean. We know that birds and fish and even some larger marine mammals eat these plastics. We know there are chemicals in the plastics and we know that the chemicals can absorb other toxic chemicals that are floating around in the ocean. So now the big question is, what are those plastics doing to the animals that eat them."
I'm sure you get this question a lot: we know marine debris in the ocean is a bad thing ... so why don't we just clean it up? Especially if most of the trash is contained in 'garbage patch' areas because of the way the debris naturally accumulates because of ocean currents.
[Dianna Parker] "The words 'garbage patch' accurately describes what it is, because these are patches of ocean that contain our garbage. But they're not areas where you can easily go through and skim trash off the surface. First of all, because they are tiny micro plastics that aren't easily removable from the ocean. But also just because of the size of this area. We did some quick calculations that if you tried to clean up less than one percent of the North Pacific Ocean it would take 67 ships one year to clean up that portion. And the bottom line is that until we prevent debris from entering the ocean at the source, it's just going to keep congregating in these areas. We could go out and clean it all up and then still have the same problem on our hands as long as there's debris entering the ocean."
And that's really the big problem — to prevent the debris from entering the ocean in the first place. So what can you, me, or anyone do to help?
[Dianna Parker] "There's so much that we can do to keep debris from entering the ocean. It's as simple as changing your individual behavior every day, creating less waste, reusing what you can, remembering to recycle ... littering is obviously a no-no. And then going out and joining a beach clean up. It's difficult to really understand the problem until you get out there and see it first-hand, how bad the problem is." And I imagine you've had plenty of opportunities to go out there and see how bad it is first-hand.
[Dianna Parker] "I absolutely have. For example, every year I go out with the International Coastal Cleanup and work to pick up trash from the Anacostia and Potomac in Washington, DC, and the amount of trash you find on the shorelines is just incredible. Bottles, bags, aerosol cans, all mixed together. In some places it's like a thick mat.
And so these are really populous, urban areas. But then we also see the same kind of trash on really remote beaches. For example, I was on beach in Lanai in Hawaii and we found everything from plastic bottles to flip flops, fishing gear, we found an entire couch. And some of this debris was clearly local and some of it had clearly come from other countries around the Pacific Rim. So debris can touch even the most remote places."
Given what you know, working on this problem day in and day out, I would think it would feel kind of like a hopeless, overwhelming problem.
[Dianna Parker] "It's not a hopeless situation. Marine debris is absolutely a solvable problem because it comes from us humans and our everyday practices. We can take any number of steps to keep it from entering the ocean and that can happen at the highest level with governments and it can happen at the lowest level individuals and everyday choices."
Thanks, Dianna, for taking the time to chat with us about this. That was Dianna Parker, communications specialist with NOAA's Marine Debris Program.
Want to learn more? Check our show notes for the links. You can find us on the web at oceanservice.noaa.gov. Have a question? Shoot us an email at nos.info@noaa.gov
Stiamo avvelenando gli oceani con la plastic, quella che si usa-e-butta! In due generazioni potremmo distruggere il mare, a meno che ci rimbocchiamo le mani! Usiamo il buon senso e la smettiamo d'inquinare e buttare plastica nell'ambiente! Se vogliamo sopravvivere non abbiamo altra scelta! Tutti dobbiamo fare la nostra parte!
This past week I was co-teaching in Mrs. Vissat's class. She is reading teacher, and was reading the book titled: "Plastiki". This non-fiction book tells the story of several men and a woman who sailed on Plastiki (a boat largely made of plastic bottles), from San Francisco, USA, to Sydney Australia. I was shocked to learn that there are huge islands of plastic in the middle of our oceans. Look at these images, read the transcript from NOAA, the National Ocean Service, and then watch the documentary: PLASTIC PARADISE. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, and see it for yourself. In the meantime I'll be taking action I'll be writing to Washington and NY State legislator and make them aware of this threat to out oceans. We must all cooperate and stop using plastics and/or at least recycle them instead of dumping them into the environment and cause irreparable harm to nature.
In this post you'll find the following info.: Facts about ocean plastic pollution from the National Geographic and NOAA, National Oceanic Administration, and way on how each one of us can help to save the oceans.
La settimana scorsa ho insegnato nella classe di quarta elementare della mia collega, l'insegnante di lettura, la signora Pat Vissat. Stavamo leggendo e discutendo un libro molto interessante e pieno di belle immagini sconvolgenti, dal titolo: "The Voyage of Plastiki" (Il Viaggio di Plastiki) . E' una storia vera di diversi uomini e alcune donne che hanno navigato su Plastiki (una barca in gran parte fatta di bottiglie di plastica). Hanno salpato (partito) da San Francisco, negli Stati Uniti d'America, e sono arrivati a Sydney in Australia, dopo un paio di mesi.
Io sapeva che l'inquinamento e' un gran problema, ma sono rimasto scioccato di vedere che ci sono enormi isole di plastica nel mezzo dei nostri oceani. Guardate le immagini, leggete la trascrizione dal NOAA, il Servizio Nazionale Americano degli Oceani, e poi guardare il documentario: PLASTICA PARADISE. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, e vedete/costatate di persona. Nel frattempo sara' importante reagire- fare qualcosa per proteggere i mari. Io ho gia' scritto a Washington e ai leaders dello Stato di New York, per passare quest'informazione- questa minaccia ai nostri oceani. Ma dobbiamo essere tutti collaborare e smettere di usare la plastica, rifiutarla quando si fanno e spese, e / o almeno reciclarla invece di scaricarla nell'immondizia- perche' poi va' a finire nell'ambiente (usalmente nel mare), e causa danni alla flora (piante) e alla fauna marina (i pesci e gli animal del mare). insomma la plastica causa danni irreparabili alla natura. E se continuiamo di questo passo, inquinando sempre di piu', sara' la nostra fine. In questo post /articolo troverete le seguenti informazioni. Fatti sull'inquinamento di plastica dell'oceano dal National Geographic e NOAA, National Oceanic Administration, e i modi in cui ognuno di noi può contribuire a salvare gli oceani.
This, below, is an award winning documentary by ANGELA SUN. Click on the link under the image, and then watch the whole movie- which received many awards. YOU CAN PURCHASE IT ON AMAZON- AS I DID FOR 12.99- Hopefully it will inspire you to do something to help save the ocean.
The
invention of synthetic plastic created an era of disposable products.
Watertight and endlessly malleable, plastic is the perfect invention
yet...
youtube.com
OUR PLASTIC IS KILLING MILLIONS OF BIRDS. Watch this short video and see how, for yourself.
This video is about an island in the ocean at 2000 km from any other coast line. Nobody lives there, only birds and yet ....You will not believe your eyes!!!...
The Great Pacific Garbage Patch (Tuesday, July 1, 2014)
THIS BLOG IS FULL OF FACTS- It was Published by NOAA - the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (www.oceanservice.noaa.gov)
Title: Making Waves: Episode 126
Transcript
This is Making Waves from NOAA's National Ocean Service. I'm Troy Kitch. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch. I bet you've heard of it. It's a phrase that's really caught on in the past few years. And it's easy to see why: it conjures up a powerful image ... a vast vortex of human waste — plastic bags, tires, cans, barrels, you name it ... floating out there in the ocean. But here's the thing: it doesn't really look like that at all. What it looks like to the human eye, from satellites, is, for the most part, well ... not much at all. Most of it is all but invisible. How can that be?
Well, I recently sat down with Dianna Parker from the NOAA Marine Debris Program to find out what the garbage patch is and isn't, what we know and don't know, and what we can do about this ocean-sized problem. Dianna, welcome and thanks for joining us. Let's start with the obvious question: what are we talking about when we say 'garbage patch?' [Dianna Parker] “A lot of people hear the word patch and they immediately think of almost like a blanket of trash that can easily be scooped up, but actually these areas are always moving and changing with the currents, and it's mostly these tiny plastics that you can't immediately see with the naked eye."
I noticed that you said garbage patch 'areas.' So the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is only one area in the ocean where marine debris concentrates?
[Dianna Parker] "There are garbage patches all over the world. These are areas where debris naturally accumulates. So there are garbage patches of all different sizes and shapes and compositions. The one that we know the most about is the Great Pacific Garbage Patch which lies in an area between Hawaii and California. What we know about this area is that it's made up of tiny micro plastics, almost akin to a peppery soup, with scattered larger items, fishing gear, those kind of items swirling around."
A peppery soup? Could you explain that again?
[Dianna Parker] "Well, imagine tiny, tiny micro plastics just swirling around, mixing in the water column from waves and wind, that's always moving and changing with the currents. These are tiny plastics that you might not even see if you sailed through the middle of the garbage patch, they're so small and mixed throughout the water column."
I would think that most of the plastics that ends up in the ocean are bigger pieces ... like bags and bottles and plastic toys. But you're saying that most of the plastic is so small that's it's hard or impossible to see. Can you talk a little more about the plastic debris in the ocean ... why it's so small?
[Dianna Parker] "There are many different kinds of plastics out in the ocean and they come from a number of different sources. So, there are teeny, tiny micro plastics out there that were either manufactured to be small — for example, the microbeads in face wash can be plastic; there are also little, tiny plastic pellets that we sometimes call ‘'nurdles' that are used to make larger items but then there are also tiny plastics that are shards of larger items. Plastics never really go away. They just break down over and over and over again until they become smaller and smaller from sunlight and other environmental factors [like] waves, big storms, those kind of things."
So we have these vast regions in the ocean where the water column looks like a peppery soup because of all these small bits and pieces of plastic. I would imagine this plastic kind of looks like food. Do we know if fish and birds are eating this stuff?
[Dianna Parker] "We know that some species of birds and fish eat micro plastics. They even eat some larger plastics. So for example, the Laysan Albatross in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, we know that just about every dead albatross found on Midway Atoll has some form of plastic in its stomach. We don't know if that's what killed it, but we know that this is becoming a big problem. So we know that there are micro plastics in the ocean. We know that birds and fish and even some larger marine mammals eat these plastics. We know there are chemicals in the plastics and we know that the chemicals can absorb other toxic chemicals that are floating around in the ocean. So now the big question is, what are those plastics doing to the animals that eat them."
I'm sure you get this question a lot: we know marine debris in the ocean is a bad thing ... so why don't we just clean it up? Especially if most of the trash is contained in 'garbage patch' areas because of the way the debris naturally accumulates because of ocean currents.
[Dianna Parker] "The words 'garbage patch' accurately describes what it is, because these are patches of ocean that contain our garbage. But they're not areas where you can easily go through and skim trash off the surface. First of all, because they are tiny micro plastics that aren't easily removable from the ocean. But also just because of the size of this area. We did some quick calculations that if you tried to clean up less than one percent of the North Pacific Ocean it would take 67 ships one year to clean up that portion. And the bottom line is that until we prevent debris from entering the ocean at the source, it's just going to keep congregating in these areas. We could go out and clean it all up and then still have the same problem on our hands as long as there's debris entering the ocean."
And that's really the big problem — to prevent the debris from entering the ocean in the first place. So what can you, me, or anyone do to help?
[Dianna Parker] "There's so much that we can do to keep debris from entering the ocean. It's as simple as changing your individual behavior every day, creating less waste, reusing what you can, remembering to recycle ... littering is obviously a no-no. And then going out and joining a beach clean up. It's difficult to really understand the problem until you get out there and see it first-hand, how bad the problem is." And I imagine you've had plenty of opportunities to go out there and see how bad it is first-hand.
[Dianna Parker] "I absolutely have. For example, every year I go out with the International Coastal Cleanup and work to pick up trash from the Anacostia and Potomac in Washington, DC, and the amount of trash you find on the shorelines is just incredible. Bottles, bags, aerosol cans, all mixed together. In some places it's like a thick mat.
And so these are really populous, urban areas. But then we also see the same kind of trash on really remote beaches. For example, I was on beach in Lanai in Hawaii and we found everything from plastic bottles to flip flops, fishing gear, we found an entire couch. And some of this debris was clearly local and some of it had clearly come from other countries around the Pacific Rim. So debris can touch even the most remote places."
Given what you know, working on this problem day in and day out, I would think it would feel kind of like a hopeless, overwhelming problem.
[Dianna Parker] "It's not a hopeless situation. Marine debris is absolutely a solvable problem because it comes from us humans and our everyday practices. We can take any number of steps to keep it from entering the ocean and that can happen at the highest level with governments and it can happen at the lowest level individuals and everyday choices."
Thanks, Dianna, for taking the time to chat with us about this. That was Dianna Parker, communications specialist with NOAA's Marine Debris Program.
Want to learn more? Check our show notes for the links. You can find us on the web at oceanservice.noaa.gov. Have a question? Shoot us an email at nos.info@noaa.gov
Posted by
bigmuddygirl
at
3:52 PM
http://nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/great-pacific-garbage-patch/
You can also find additional info and images at:
http://www.lazerhorse.org/2013/11/23/great-pacific-garbage-patch/#
Great Pacific Garbage Patch - National Geographic Society
nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/great-pacific-garbage-patch/
Sep 19, 2014 - The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is a collection of marine debris in the North Pacific ... National Geographic
"About 80% of the debris in the Great
Pacific Garbage Patch comes from land-based activities in North America
and Asia. Trash from the coast of North America takes about six years to
reach the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, while trash from Japan and other
Asian countries takes about a year.
The remaining 20% of debris in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch comes from boaters, offshore oil rigs, and large cargo
ships that dump or lose debris directly into the water. The majority of
this debris—about 705,000 tons—is fishing nets. More unusual items,
such as computer monitors and LEGOs, come from dropped shipping containers.
While many different types of trash enter the ocean, plastics make
up the majority of marine debris for two reasons. First, plastic’s durability, low cost, and malleability mean that it’s being used in more and more consumer and industrial products. Second, plastic goods do not biodegrade but instead break down into smaller pieces.
In the ocean, the sun breaks down these plastics into tinier and tinier pieces, a process known as photodegradation.
Scientists have collected up to 750,000 bits of microplastic in a
single square kilometer of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch—that’s about
1.9 million bits per square mile. Most of this debris comes from plastic
bags, bottle caps, plastic water bottles, and Styrofoam cups.
Marine debris can be very harmful to marine
life in the gyre. For instance, loggerhead sea turtles often mistake
plastic bags for jellies, their favorite food. Albatrosses mistake
plastic resin pellets for fish eggs and feed them to chicks, which die of starvation or ruptured organs.
Seals and other marine mammals are especially at risk. They can get entangled in abandoned
plastic fishing nets, which are being discarded more often because of
their low cost. Seals and other mammals often drown in these forgotten
nets—a phenomenon known as “ghost fishing.”
Marine debris can also disturb marine food webs
in the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre. As microplastics and other trash
collect on or near the surface of the ocean, they block sunlight from
reaching plankton and algae below. Algae and plankton are the most common autotrophs, or producers, in the marine food web. Autotrophs are organisms that can produce their own nutrients from oxygen, carbon, and sunlight.
If algae and plankton communities are threatened, the entire food web may change. Animals that feed on algae and plankton, such as fish and turtles, will have less food. If populations of those animals decrease, there will be less food for apex predators such as tuna, sharks, and whales. Eventually, seafood becomes less available and more expensive for people.
These dangers are compounded by the fact that plastics both leach out and absorb harmful pollutants. As plastics break down through photodegradation, they leach out colorants and chemicals, such as bisphenol A (BPA), that have been linked to environmental and health problems. Conversely, plastics can also absorb pollutants, such as PCBs, from the seawater. These chemicals can then enter the food chain when consumed by marine life.
Patching Up the Patch
Because the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is so far from any country’s coastline, no nation will take responsibility or provide the funding to clean it up. Charles Moore, the man who discovered the vortex, says cleaning up the garbage patch would “bankrupt any country” that tried it.
Many individuals and international organizations, however, are dedicated to preventing the patch from growing.
Cleaning up marine debris is not as easy as it sounds. Many
microplastics are the same size as small sea animals, so nets designed
to scoop up trash would catch these creatures as well. Even if we could
design nets that would just catch garbage, the size of the oceans makes
this job far too time-consuming to consider. The National Ocean and
Atmospheric Administration’s Marine Debris Program has estimated that it would take 67 ships one year to clean up less than one percent of the North Pacific Ocean.
Many expeditions have traveled
through the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Charles Moore, who discovered
the patch in 1997, continues to raise awareness through his own
environmental organization, the Algalita Marine Research Foundation.
During a 2014 expedition, Moore and his team used aerial drones, to assess from above the extent of the trash below. The drones determined that there is 100 times more plastic by weight than previously measured. The team also discovered more permanent plastic features, or islands, some over 15 meters (50 feet) in length.
All the floating plastic in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch inspired National Geographic Emerging
Explorer David de Rothschild and his team at Adventure Ecology to create a large catamaran made of plastic bottles: the Plastiki. The sturdiness of the Plastiki displayed the strength and durability of plastics, the creative ways that they can be repurposed, and the threat they pose to the environment when they don’t decompose. In 2010, the crew successfully navigated the Plastiki from San Francisco, California, to Sydney, Australia.
Explorer David de Rothschild and his team at Adventure Ecology to create a large catamaran made of plastic bottles: the Plastiki. The sturdiness of the Plastiki displayed the strength and durability of plastics, the creative ways that they can be repurposed, and the threat they pose to the environment when they don’t decompose. In 2010, the crew successfully navigated the Plastiki from San Francisco, California, to Sydney, Australia.
Scientists and explorers agree that limiting or eliminating our use
of disposable plastics and increasing our use of biodegradable
resources will be the best way to clean up the Great Pacific Garbage
Patch. Organizations such as the Plastic Pollution Coalition and the
Plastic Oceans Foundation are using social media and direct action
campaigns to support individuals, manufacturers, and businesses in their transition from toxic, disposable plastics to biodegradable or reusable materials." (From: http://nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/great-pacific-garbage-patch/)
(From: http://nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/great-pacific-garbage-patch/)
Great Pacific Garbage Patch / Humans Suck
On November 23, 2013 by Lazer Horse
Humans
have really made a mess of this planet haven’t they? To be fair, it
wasn’t entirely our fault initially. I mean, burning coal and oil just
seemed really handy, we weren’t to know it would choke the skies and
eventually us. And who knew that something we put in fridges would punch
a hole in a crucial but invisible layer in the sky? And plastic, how
brilliant is plastic? You can make anything you like with it, it doesn’t
break very easily, it’s bendy or stiff and it’s dead cheap, brilliant!
It’s just a shame that it doesn’t ever, ever go away. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch,
or Pacific Trash Vortex, is basically a graveyard for plastics and
chemical sludge. The currents of the earth’s oceans converge in such a
way that any old crud that we bung out ends up in this hellish, filth
wart in the seas.
Most sailors don’t need to navigate the area
where the Great Pacific Garbage Patch resides, it’s very remote. But a
chap called Charles J. Moore visited in 1997 after some boat race or
other. Charles and his crew were the first people to report the state of
the area back to oceanographers. He said
…it might sound unbelievable but there was not a single clear spot around us. It didn’t matter where we looked, garbage was floating around us everywhere.
(From: http://www.lazerhorse.org/2013/11/23/great-pacific-garbage-patch/#)
OTHER VIDEOS, ABOUT THIS ECOLOGICAL DISASTER;
1,724,789 views
Published on Sep 6, 2012
Vice
sails to the North Pacific Gyre, collecting point for all of the
ocean's flotsam and home of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch: a mythical,
Texas-sized island made entirely of our trash.
An OPEN LETTER TO OUR GOVERNMENT LEADERS:
Dear President Obama, Senator Schumer, Gillebradt, Congressman Tonko, Governor Cuomo (NY State), Assemblyman Tedisco, Santabarbara & Senator Farley,
An Open letter to out Government Leaders (to President Obama & my the NY State Representatives) about a serious problem:
THE GREAT OCEAN PLASTIC PATCHES - A THREAT TO THE OCEAN'S AND OUR SURVIVAL
I am a school teacher and a father of two children, I am concerned about our environment. Last week I was reading/discussing a book with another colleague 4th graders. It was about the a sailboat made from plastic, including 12,000 plastic bottles. This boat sailed from San Francisco to Sydney, Australia, in 2012, to try to raise awareness about plastic pollution in our ocean. I was amazed by this boat, the person who designed it and built it. However I was saddened by all the amount of plastic that is floating. And also learned, from National Geographic that lots of this plastic pollution is submerged too.
Let me share some facts collected by National Geographic about these floating, and also submerged, plastic islands.
About 80% of the debris in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch comes from land-based activities in North America and Asia.
The remaining 20% of debris in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch comes from boaters, offshore oil rigs, and large cargo ships that dump or lose debris directly into the water. The majority of this debris—about 705,000 tons—is fishing nets. More unusual items, such as computer monitors and LEGOs, come from dropped shipping containers.
While many different types of trash enter the ocean, plastics make up the majority of marine debris for two reasons. First, plastic’s durability, low cost, and malleability mean that it’s being used in more and more consumer and industrial products. Second, plastic goods do not biodegrade but instead break down into smaller pieces.
In the ocean, the sun breaks down these plastics into tinier and tinier pieces, a process known as photodegradation. Scientists have collected up to 750,000 bits of microplastic in a single square kilometer of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch—that’s about 1.9 million bits per square mile. Most of this debris comes from plastic bags, bottle caps, plastic water bottles, and Styrofoam cups.
Marine debris can be very harmful to marine life in the gyre. For instance, loggerhead sea turtles often mistake plastic bags for jellies, their favorite food. Albatrosses mistake plastic resin pellets for fish eggs and feed them to chicks, which die of starvation or ruptured organs.
Seals and other marine mammals are especially at risk. They can get entangled in abandoned plastic fishing nets, which are being discarded more often because of their low cost. Seals and other mammals often drown in these forgotten nets—a phenomenon known as “ghost fishing.”
Marine debris can also disturb marine food webs in the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre. As microplastics and other trash collect on or near the surface of the ocean, they block sunlight from reaching plankton and algae below. Algae and plankton are the most common autotrophs, or producers, in the marine food web. Autotrophs are organisms that can produce their own nutrients from oxygen, carbon, and sunlight.
If algae and plankton communities are threatened, the entire food web may change. Animals that feed on algae and plankton, such as fish and turtles, will have less food. If populations of those animals decrease, there will be less food for apex predators such as tuna, sharks, and whales. Eventually, seafood becomes less available and more expensive for people.
These dangers are compounded by the fact that plastics both leach out and absorb harmful pollutants. As plastics break down through photodegradation, they leach out colorants and chemicals, such as bisphenol A (BPA), that have been linked to environmental and health problems. Conversely, plastics can also absorb pollutants, such as PCBs, from the seawater. These chemicals can then enter the food chain when consumed by marine life.
In conclusion, it is evident that this concerns our survival on this planet. Hence, we all must do our part, do something to stop this threat. I encourage you to follow the 6-Rs. REFUSE, REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE, RESPECT, RESPONSIBILITY.
1) REFUSE to say no to plastic that gets used once and thrown out. Dici di no all plastica- rifiutala!
2) REDUCE, or cut down on waste, try to avoid plastic packages & containers, and choose products with the least amount of packaging.
RIDURRE l'uso/consumo della plastica, come i sacchetti e le bottiglie.
2) REDUCE, or cut down on waste, try to avoid plastic packages & containers, and choose products with the least amount of packaging.
RIDURRE l'uso/consumo della plastica, come i sacchetti e le bottiglie.
3) REUSE, or use & reuse cloth bags and metal or glass containers- you'll make less waste this way.
RI-usa i contenitori e sacchetti di plastica
RI-usa i contenitori e sacchetti di plastica
4) Recycle what you can't refuse, reduce or reuse.
5) RESPECT our planet by not hurting it with pollution.
6) RESPONSIBILITY. This is everyone job, we all must do our part. Follow at least the 3-Rs, Reduce, Reuse and Recycle, also educate your children and/or friends about the dangers of polluting our environment.
Prendersi cura dell'ambienteE' il dovere di tutti
Prendersi cura dell'ambienteE' il dovere di tutti
7) RETELL. Tell, inform and write our political leaders about the threat of pollution. Ask them to take action to protect the environment, because this is a very serious threat to our planet and to our survival existence. The Federal government could give financial incentives to states, to encourage them in curbing plastic pollution, and eventually ban all throw away plastic. NY State could educate and provide financial incentives to the businesses and/or organizations, like schools, hospitals, and even to State government agencies. So that use-only-once plastic could be banned, and/or controlled, or at least curbed, recycled, and eventually avoid its use completely, so that it would not pose threat and end up the environment.
INFORMARE/EDUCARE, tutti, bambini, giovani, adulti, e i media.
Thank you.
(You, anyone has my permission to copy and paste this letter, and/or any parts of it for the purpose of sending it to our government leaders at your local, State and or to members of Congress).
GROUPS THAT WORK TO SAVE THE OCEANS
INFORMARE/EDUCARE, tutti, bambini, giovani, adulti, e i media.
Thank you.
(You, anyone has my permission to copy and paste this letter, and/or any parts of it for the purpose of sending it to our government leaders at your local, State and or to members of Congress).
GROUPS THAT WORK TO SAVE THE OCEANS
Stop Plastic Pollution
A massive volume of plastic garbage
now litters every ocean on the planet, posing a growing threat to marine
life. Hundreds of species of seabirds, whales, sea turtles, and other
marine life ingest or get entangled in plastic, and scientists say the
number is rising along with the amount of marine trash.
NRDC fights to protect marine life by preventing plastic pollution from reaching the ocean in the first place.
One of the most effective solutions is to call on producers of
single-use plastics to take greater responsibility for their products.
Many states mandate that manufacturers of paint and carpet recover and
recycle their products after use. Similarly, makers of plastic packaging
should be required to find innovative ways to design better materials
that can be more fully recovered for recycling or reuse. They should
also help cover the costs required to keep plastic out of our oceans.NRDC works at the state level to support these types of strategies strategies and to sharply reduce the use of major culprits that enter the ocean, such as single use plastic bags.
In California, for instance, we helped make the economic case for dealing with marine plastics head-on. We analyzed data from coastal communities in the state and found they spend $428 million every year to clean up plastic trash and debris from waterways.
As part of a growing coalition of waste management, community, environmental, and business groups, we push for measures that would address the many different types of single-use plastics. We recommend creating incentives for industry to use less plastic packaging for their products, make this packaging fully recyclable, and ensure that recycling actually happens. Not only would these measures reduce marine trash and the costs of managing it, but they would also create jobs: One study found that recycling 75 percent of the nation’s waste could generate 1.1 million jobs by 2030.
(https://www.nrdc.org/issues/stop-plastic-pollution?gclid=Cj0KEQjwmpW6BRCf5sXp59_U_ssBEiQAGCV9Gl)l46d83jhcrBj6NRDC fights to protect marine life by preventing plastic pollution from reaching the ocean in the first place.
In California, for instance, we helped make the economic case for dealing with marine plastics head-on. We analyzed data from coastal communities in the state and found they spend $428 million every year to clean up plastic trash and debris from waterways.
As part of a growing coalition of waste management, community, environmental, and business groups, we push for measures that would address the many different types of single-use plastics. We recommend creating incentives for industry to use less plastic packaging for their products, make this packaging fully recyclable, and ensure that recycling actually happens. Not only would these measures reduce marine trash and the costs of managing it, but they would also create jobs: One study found that recycling 75 percent of the nation’s waste could generate 1.1 million jobs by 2030.
Adwww.oceanconservancy.org/
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