Know your GIANT Oceanic GARBAGE PATCHes

[underpants]

The gyre has actually given birth to two large masses of ever-accumulating trash, known as the Western and Eastern Pacific Garbage Patches, sometimes collectively called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The Eastern Garbage Patch floats between Hawaii and California; scientists estimate its size as two times bigger than Texas . The Western Garbage Patch forms east of Japan and west of Hawaii. Each swirling mass of refuse is massive and collects trash from all over the world. The patches are connected by a thin 6,000-mile long current called the Subtropical Convergence Zone. Research flights showed that significant amounts of trash also accumulate in the Convergence Zone.
http://science.howstuffworks.com/great-pacific-garbage-patch.htm



An Island of Garbage Twice the Size of Texas
http://www.buffaloreadings.com/article.php?story=20071030224054797&mode=print





North Pacific Gyre North Equatorial Current · Kuroshio Current · North Pacific Current · California Current The five major oceanic gyres
South Pacific Gyre South Equatorial Current · East Australian Current · Antarctic Circumpolar Current · Humboldt Current
North Atlantic Gyre North Equatorial Current · Gulf Stream · North Atlantic Current · Canary Current
South Atlantic Gyre South Equatorial Current · Brazil Current · Antarctic Circumpolar Current · Benguela Current
Indian Ocean Gyre South Equatorial Current · Agulhas Current · Antarctic Circumpolar Current · West Australian Current
Non-tropical gyres Beaufort Gyre · Indian Monsoon Gyre · Antarctic Circumpolar Current · Weddell Gyre · Ross Gyre


Effects of Plastic and the Great Pacific Garbage Patch

http://science.howstuffworks.com/great-pacific-garbage-patch1.htm

[Ron Green]

1. We're so screwed,

and very few people want to talk about this stuff. Oh, wait. That's WHY we're screwed.

[natrat]

20. wtf obama the savior doesn't mention it,,,i expect hillary's silence cuz she's a scumbag but...

[Lorien]

21. Hey, they both think that subsidizing ethanol and waiting to cap

emissions until 2030 is enough to placate those of us who care about the environment. Yep, we are truly fucked!

[shellgame26]

2. whoever the next president is

this needs to be on top of the agenda. There needs to be a campaign to ban plastic for one. Or if not ban then drastically limit. Hey plastic didn't come around until the 20th century. I think man-kind was doing just fine without it before. There are some good uses for plastic, such as in medical settings where, for example plastic is used to make incubators. But that plastic is not being thrown away after 2 seconds of use. When was the last time you went to the grocery store? HOW MANY FUCKING PLASTIC BAGS DID THAT CLERK GIVE YOU?

[underpants]

12. Welcome to DU

:hi:

I used to absolutely freeze baggers in their tracks with "this will all fit in one bag"

I bring my own bag now BUT look at your local grocery store the next time many of them have "strive for five" signs near the bagging area. Yes they have to remind baggers not to put each item in A plastic bag.

I believe the UK starting taxing them 30 cents or so and the plastic bags went away pronto.

[Lorien]

23. Amen. I bring my own bags, but excess packaging is also a huge issue

I recycle packaging from every product I buy-and my recycle bins are usually full every week! Cosmetics companies in particular need to get a grip. A tube of lotion doesn't also need to be in a box wrapped in plastic inside clamshell packaging. In Europe you can't use excess packaging of that sort. We need those same regulations here!

[dysfunctional press]

42. they never give me enough- that's why i go thru the self-checkout and double-plastic-bag everything.

i love the plastic grocery bags, and find many uses for them- although i mostly use them for trash bags and picking up dog crap.

[OKthatsIT]

3. Is this from dumping trash directly? The USA doesnt allow it

I remember when that was discontinued. No barges have been permitted to offshore dump for 30 yrs. They realized dumping created a spreading plague of sludge..very contaminated sludge.

This is the first time I've heard about this. It's really heartbreaking news.

[kestrel91316]

6. Mostly it gets discarded thoughtlessly, or falls off the trash truck.

We have an annual beach cleanup day in CA and they get tons and tons of crap, most of it plastic food packaging (and an inordinate number of cigarette butts).

http://www.coastal.ca.gov/publiced/ccd/ccd.html


Our storm drains drain to the sea. The stuff accumulates for a year, then in our winter rains with their flash floods it all gets washed into the ocean. Absolutely discraceful situation. We do our best - we have an army of CNG-powered street sweepers, but seriously, people just need to stop being such utter pigs, and better yet, don't buy things in plastic (and dispose of properly or recycle if you must buy it).

[Canuckistanian]

7. Has anyone ever been charged with illegal dumping?

I'd guess not. Or else they happily paid the fine, because it's far more profitable to do it and pay the measly fine and continue the practice.

And anyways, it's not just the illegal dumpers. It's from freighters, fishing ships and just plain airborne plastic blown into the sea from land.

The problem is plastic is forever - or at least for a few lifetimes.

[Beaverhausen]

17. Didn't cruise ships simply dump their garbage out to sea until a few years ago?

That's what I heard at least.

[Arctic Dave]

22. Everybody dumped their trash out there.

I was amazed when I was in the navy and we were out in the middle of the Pacific Ocean and we pass by a floating refrigerator more then five hundred miles from anywere. There is soooooo much trash out in the oceans it is unbelievable. Whenever you made way for port the first thing you would see is more trash in the ocean, then smog on the horizon and then land. It is like that off the coast of any continent and any country.

[bluesmail]

4. This is yet another reason for Cheney to call off the elections

or however it's done anymore. K&R

[dysfunctional press]

43. how so...?

:eyes:

some people are just too fucking nuts.

[kestrel91316]

5. Your task, DUers, should you decide to accept it, is:

1) Read Garbageland (I forget the author)
2) Avoid buying anything packaged in plastic
3) Avoid buying anything made of plastic
4) Should you be forced to buy either, then RECYCLE when it has finished its useful life.

Most importantly: NEVER EVER buy fast food wrapped in plastic - that shit never even makes it HOME, let alone reused.

But definitely read the book. Preferably acquired borrowed from your library or swapped for at Paperbackswap.com. It will change your life (unless you are a useless waste of oxygen, in which case I can't help you).

[ColbertWatcher]

9. Link to Garbageland book...

...http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Garbage-Land/Elizabeth-Royte/e/9780316154611/?itm=1">Garbage Land: On the Secret Trail of Trash by Elizabeth Royte

BTW, thank you for posting those pictures, they're going in the "database".

[underpants]

11. Garbageland-I'll check it out

thanks

[ColbertWatcher]

13. You're welcome...

...I was hoping to save a picture of the garbage patch between Hawaii and California to my "database", but cannot find a picture of it.

Any ideas where I can find one?

I have plenty of pictures of garbage-strewn beaches, but no satellite imagery.

Any help is appreciated!

[underpants]

14. That was what I was looking for

but as big as these things are they don't seem to appear on a satellite shot. I only went two pages deep on google images though :shrug:

I started with Giant Pacific Garbage Patch and then did PAcific gyre

good luck. Maybe NASA has a shot of it-call or email them.

[ColbertWatcher]

15. I suspect...

...the only "photographic proof" of this type of pollution will exist in foreign waters.

America pollutes as much as we torture.

[OKthatsIT]

19. We need to go back to CO-OP shopping...

The local Coop bought the bulk foods and then we brought our own containers and bags.

[kestrel91316]

33. We had a co-op when I was in college. It was the local hippie hangout.

I'm sure they closed years ago.

I loved the bins and paper bags. I never joined, but mulled it over on more than one occasion. It was the only place in Ft. Collins to get a whole long list of healthy ingredients for home cooking back then......

[klook]

8. Thanks for posting this.

Everybody needs to see this, and modify their habits accordingly.

It royally pisses me off when dumbasses try to say that "plastic doesn't matter" because "it came from the earth, so the earth can handle it." This shows just how wrong that point of view is.


Bottle caps and other plastic objects are visible inside the decomposed carcass of this Laysan albatoss on Kure Atoll, which lies in a remote and virtually uninhabited region of the North Pacific. The bird probably mistook the plastics for food and ingested them while foraging.

Photo by Cynthia Vanderlip
-- Natural History Magazine

[shellgame26]

30. Jesus H Christ

That's just fucking sad!

[Fox Mulder]

10. K&R.

More people need to see this. I hope to gods that whoever our next President is should place this at the top of his/her agenda.

[Duer 157099]

16. In cooking, chef's use this technique to clarify stocks

They are called "rafts" and they're made of protein and their purpose is to collect the circulating fats and proteins in the broth that cause the cloudiness.

Isn't it interesting that the same principle operates in the ocean (albeit with much more dire consequenes, since there's no (yet) great big ladel in the sky who can lift that shit out and pour it down the sink).

[OKthatsIT]

18. Waxed cardboard/paper is a great solution.

It can be 'molded' into shapes, too.

[alphafemale]

25. I remember when milk was generally sold that way. Now generally orgainic milk is.

Another reason to go organic.

Most other beverages were sold in glass.

The prevalence of plastic containers has really exploded in my lifetime.

[file83]

24. A sci-fi book called "Snow Crash" discussed this in 1992, described it as "The Raft"...

"From a distance, it looks bigger than it really is. Getting closer, he can see that this illusion is caused by an enveloping, self-made slick/cloud of sewage and air pollution, fading out into the ocean and the atmosphere.

It orbits the Pacific clockwise. When they fire up the boilers on the Enterprise, it can control its direction a little bit, but real navigation is a practical impossibility with all the other shit lashed onto it. It mostly has to go where the wind and the Coriolis effect take it. A couple of years ago, it was going by the Philippines, Vietnam, China, Siberia, picking up Refus. Then it swung up the Aleutian chain, down the Alaska panhandle, and now it's gliding past the small town of Port Sherman, Oregon, near the California border.

As the Raft moves through the Pacific, riding mostly on ocean currents, it occasionally sheds great hunks of itself. Eventually, these fragments wash up in some place like Santa Barbara, still lashed together, carrying a payload of skeletons and gnawed bones."

--Neal Stephenson's http://vx.netlux.org/lib/mns00.html">Snow Crash, Chapter 36

[underpants]

27. That is very interesting

This thread has two books in it that I have to now read

Thanks

[arendt]

28. How could I forget "The Raft"? And the privatized aircraft carrier at its center?

I forget, did the nutzoid billionaire buy the carrier from General Bob's or Admiral Jim's military surplus?

arendt

[file83]

36. I think L. Bob Rife got it directly from the U.S. Navy...

"...formerly of the U.S. Navy, now the personal yacht of L. Bob Rife, who beat out both General Jim's Defense System and Admiral Bob's Global Security in a furious bidding war."

[OneBlueSky]

26. the $64,000 question is -- will humankind DO anything about this? . . .

or will these plastic continents be allowed to fester and grow until they cover most of every ocean on the planet? . . .

I can envision a fleet of massive, specially designed ships that scoop up the plastic and shred it right on board, creating a recycled resource that could be used for any number of projects (building materials, fencing, outdoor furniture, fishing poles, etc.) . . . but who will fund these floating trash munchers, and would the return be sufficient to cover the investment and turn a profit? . . . if not, what other solutions might be feasible? . . .

or do we, the human race, just allow our garbage to continue to overpower our oceans until they block out the sunlight altogether? . . . is anyone searching for a solution, or is just something we're going to have to live (or die) with? . . .

[shellgame26]

40. There needs to be

a global effort by citizens of various countries to put pressure on their governments to ban plastics. Wanna talk boycott? LET'S FUCKING BOYCOTT DUPONT.

[shellgame26]

41. "the miracles of science"

http://www2.dupont.com/Plastics/en_US/
a million years from now when all that plastic soup is still around, our descendants are gonna say we were a lousy bunch of slobs for doing this to our planet.

[Octafish]

29. Thor Heyerdahl noticed.

The guy crossed the world's oceans aboard primitive reed and papyrus craft, crossing from Peru to Raroia Atoll in the Tuamotu Archipelago in 1947 aboard Kon-Tiki. In 1969, he crossed the Atlantic aboard Ra. I remember reading one of his books a ways back: The explorer said he noticed a big difference in pollution levels between the voyages. At times, so frequent were the tar balls from spilled crude oil, the crew couldn't use the ocean to brush their teeth in the second voyage.

During the Ra voyage, Heyerdahl wrote his first letter to the UN about the fact that the oceans of the world were becoming polluted. He was asked by the Secretary-General of the UN to make daily pollution observations during the Ra II voyage. Hardened clumps of tar were collected on 43 days of the 57-day voyage. In this way the voyage helped to raise awareness of the need to stop the pollution of the world’s seas.

SOURCE: http://www.kon-tiki.no/Ny/Dok_eng/E-Heyerdahl.html

Bush and his Base aren't going to do squat about pollution, apart from their "Final Solution" of getting rid of the excess population through war and neglect.

Thus, "We" are the ones we've been waiting for.

[KoKo]

35. I loved his book "Kon Tiki" about his first raft voyage. I wonder why

we couldn't do a giant "Vacuum" to suck up all of the waste and recycle it onshore. If one could get enough ships with giant vacuums we might start to at least make a dent in it while we resume efforts to control it on land.

Could this be a Co-Operative World effort with all our Navy and other ships from countries in Nato and elsewhere participating? Even countries like Japan who do so much deep net trawling might help if they thought the "clean up" would allow our fish populations to recover not having to deal with all that trash floating. It's very much in the interest of Asian Nations to help in this...because their diet is so dependent on seafood. Wouldn't hurt any of the rest of us either.

A thought..

[Octafish]

37. That's the kind of Big Thinking we need.

Big Ideas are what will solve the pollution crisis.

Cartoonist Al Capp invented the smogmobile. His drew a car with a big scoop in the front. The thing cleaned the air and got good mileage. Wish I could find a drawing of it.

Did find this:



And I'm not joking. Yours is an excellent idea, KoKo01.

[bdamomma]

31. we are treating our oceans like sewers.

disgusting, what kind of world are we leaving our children. shameful

[Jennicut]

32. I hate plastic. Its a detestable invention and its everywhere.

A giantic garbage dump of waste and plastic in our oceans. Very sad and depressing on this Earth Day. I don't know if humans are capable of changing their ways. What makes me the most angry is corporations put this stuff out and everday consumers have little choice. Plastic containers are used for almost everything in food, very little carboard or glass is used. It makes a normal person feel powerless. I will do my part but it may not be enough. Its very sad to realize that if the human race goes extinct for whatever reason the Earth might be better off. It was not always like this. I guess the industrial Revolution for all its good in raising the standard of living for people and its incredible technological innovations really made a huge mess of things.

[slipslidingaway]

34. K&R. Add the environmental damage, to the mounting debt, to

the number of people and countries we are antagonizing around the world, not a pretty picture we are leaving to future generations on a variety of fronts.

:(

But we'll give another 178 billion to continue the wars.

[Duppers]

38. PBS covering it right now.

tune in or tivo.

[ColbertWatcher]

39. What's the name of the show? n/t

[Duppers]

45. it's Nat'l Geo.'s "Strange Days on Planet Earth"

Thanks for asking.

Try finding the re-runs on this 'cause it's so worth watching... it added many dimensions to the usual save-our-earth program.

[ColbertWatcher]

46. Thank You. n/t

[Duppers]

48. my pleasure.

:)

National Geographic's Strange Days on Planet Earth
Learn how human behavior is affecting the safety of the world's water supply.

http://www.pbs.org/strangedays/?campaign=pbshomefeatures_3_nationalgeographicsstrangedaysonplanetearth_2008-04-24

[Greyhound]

44. Almost every application of plastic can be substituted with hemp oil.

It can be made almost as durable as petroleum based plastics, yet remains biodegradable. Hemp fibers are superior to the myriad of petroleum based fibers, and the production creates far less pollution and is beneficial to the soil, which we have seriously depleted.

The only downside is that DuPont et al. would be hurt financially.

[Subdivisions]

47. Great post, underpants. Hey, you'll probably want to check this out:

The link below will take you to a site of film makers called VBS.tv. A few of the film makers climb aboard an ocean research vessel and take a three week journey to the great pacific trash gyre.

Here is the trailer:
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=HC_jc5_MnH8

And here is the complete 12 part series:
http://www.vbs.tv/video.php?id=1485308505

An excellent film and well worth your attention.