ecopirates.net v1.0

garbage all over

Did you ever wonder where all that packaging material goes after we freed our sandwich from it? Well there is one central spot where a good part of it will gather.

Source: Flickr

This curious penomenon is called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch (Müllstrudel in German). I.e. there exists a network of streams in the planet's oceans that will gather suspended particles in a region close to Hawaii. It is estimated that today it covers four times the surface of Germany.

In nature basicly any material will finally decompose and be recycled by another living thing. That is unfortunately not true for most plastics. In oceans they float around and can only be decomposed by photodegradation and friction. Thus they become slowly smaller and smaller and eventually aquatic organisms can take them up, distributing them even further (into the food chain). The remaining so-called mermaid's tears (aka nurdles) already have become one of the major marine pollutants.

And so I start to ask myself: "Why does everything need to be surrounded by plastic?".

By the way: Did you ever wonder that plastic is usually produced from crude oil and is therefore non-renewable?

Wikipedia: The biggest threat to the conventional plastics industry is most likely to be environmental concerns, including the release of toxic pollutants, greenhouse gas, litter, biodegradable and non-biodegradable landfill impact as a result of the production and disposal of petroleum and petroleum-based plastics. Of particular concern has been the recent accumulation of enormous quantities of plastic trash in ocean gyres.

Sources and further Reading:

• NZZ Folio (german)
• The Independent
• Wikipedia 1 2
• surftherenow.com