PLASTIC BAGS and our WATER WORLD

that was the pic you put up earlier isnt it lazy?,,,,the 1 that started the "real fishermen" debate,,,,,,again with me being an @sshole,,,as i was told,,hehehehehe

 

Flotsam & Jetsam is a global problem and talking don't fix it. Where I go, if I see some and have the means to effect proper disposal I do..... Talk is trivializing the problem.......

Good day sir....

 

YES MAYBE MUCHELY, BUT i DID NOT SEE THE REAL FISHERAMN DEBATE
Was a beautiful spot, the ships 15 at a time going past, its very narrow there
I have never called anyone names here, in any forum,, just sometimes get tired of the constant referral to various parts of male anotomy below belt Like school boy stuff from grown men

 

ya after you posted it ( back then ) i said something about idiots,,,,,then someone said their friend was a fisherman, and he watched him throw trash overboard,,,,,,i told him his friend wasnt a REAL fisherman,,,,hehe,,,,,and then off it went,,,to my "pet" names,,hahaha

 

no he was not a real anything
I built a charter fishing boat for a guy, we got to be good mates
One day we went fishing,
well you know those sooty shearwaters(mutton birds in NZ) they like to dive down take you your bait, well this guy waits til one swims up and then beats it half to death with his rod, I was nearly ill,
Dont speak to him now
we have saying
Its our playground, but their world-

 

exactly!

 

plastic ship 'Junk'

...courtesy of - latitude / ld


The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is purported to be an enormous — some estimates say twice the size of Texas — raft of, well, junk that's caught in the North Pacific Gyre. Sensational news reports make it sound as if the Patch is dense enough for a person to walk across but that has yet to be proved. What can't be denied is that plastic is a growing problem in the world's oceans that really can no longer be ignored. Several returning Solo TransPac and Pacific Cup boats have reported a disturbing amount of plastic floating around mid-Pacific. "We're seeing some kind of plastic going by every 30 seconds or so," reported Solo TransPac racer Rob Tryon. "About half of it is fishing related — netting, floats, etc. — but the other half is definitely land-based garbage: bottles, toys, baby dolls." Those kind of firsthand accounts really bring home the need to rethink our 'disposable' ways.

Dr. Marcus Eriksen and Joel Paschal have been 'sailing' Junk across the Pacific to raise awareness of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.
© 2008 Algalita Marine Research Foundation / www.algalita.org

 

i was gonna post that a while ago,,, but figured if i did,,, they'd end up in a storm,, with their "raft" coming apart,, therefore,, ADDING to the trash pile.
hehehe

 

Garbage Soup: Secrets Spewed Up by the Trash Vortex

Discovered by a sailor in 1997, the 'Great Pacific Garbage Patch' or 'trash vortex' that floats around in oceanic gyres is now of great interest to scientists, biologists, weather forecasters and marine researchers for the information it reveals about ocean currents.

There is a soup of waste – humanity’s flotsam and debris – literally clogging the Pacific Ocean. Experts say it’s growing at an alarming rate and now covers an area twice the size of the USA. This floating rubbish dump stretches from Hawaii almost to Japan and is held in place by swirling underwater currents.

Charles Moore, an American oceanographer who discovered the phenomenon and coined the phrases 'Great Pacific Garbage Patch' or 'trash vortex', believes that about 100 million tons of flotsam are circulating in the region.

Marcus Eriksen, a research director of the US-based Algalita Marine Research Foundation, which Moore founded, describes it as 'a plastic soup'.

'It moves around and when it comes close to land, as it does at the Hawaiian archipelago, the results are dramatic. The garbage patch barfs, and you get a beach covered with this confetti of plastic.'

About one-fifth of the stuff is thrown off ships or oil platforms. The rest has been discarded from the land.

Moore, a former sailor, first encountered the rubbish in 1997, while taking a short cut home from a Los Angeles to Hawaii yacht race. He had steered his craft into the 'North Pacific gyre', a vortex where the ocean circulates slowly because of little wind and extreme high pressure systems.

Gobsmacked by its magnitude, Moore, the heir to a family fortune from the oil industry, was inspired to sell his business interests and become an environmental activist. These days he warns people that unless consumers cut back on their use of disposable plastics, the plastic stew will double in size over the next decade.

In the past, rubbish that ended up in oceanic gyres has biodegraded. But modern plastics are so durable that objects half-a-century old have been found in the north Pacific dump.

Moore said that because the sea of rubbish is translucent and lies just below the water's surface, it is not detectable in satellite photographs. 'You only see it from the bows of ships,' he said.

Worldwide, about 10,000 cargo containers fall overboard each year. In most parts of the world, the dispersal of flotsam isn't of major interest to researchers. But along the busy trade routes that link eastern Asia to North America, the random rubbish and containers that drop off ships are showing scientists precisely how the Pacific Subarctic Gyre works.

Despite thousands of scientific instruments dotted around our oceans, when it comes to measuring surface currents, scientists have been limited by their equipment. Satellite-monitored probes called Argo floats drift through the ocean at depths of about 2 kilometers. Every 10 days or so, they pop up to measure the overlying water's temperature and salinity.

However, the direction and speed of deep currents, where these high-tech probes spend most of their time, don't necessarily match those of currents in the top few metres or centimeters of ocean. The path of an Argo float provides little information about surface currents.

Then there are probes specifically designed to ride surface currents. These face their own problems. Their sensors can quickly become obstructed by algae, barnacles, and other organisms that thrive in the sunlit section of the ocean.
On top of all that, probes use batteries that fail within months, only allowing them to travel a small fraction of the path around the gyre.

Now, to map the currents and clock their speeds, scientists are harnessing the power of floating junk. For the first time, scientists can estimate that a lap around the Pacific Subarctic Gyre takes approximately three years. From that and other studies of the circulating trash, researchers have noticed long-term variations in water temperature and salinity in the North Pacific that hadn't been observed previously.

Research aside, the consequences of this massive bundle of plastic debris are negative. Plastic is believed to constitute 90 per cent of all rubbish floating in the oceans. The UN Environment Program estimated in 2006 that every square mile of ocean contains 46,000 pieces of floating plastic. The group states that plastic waste causes the deaths of more than a million seabirds every year, as well as more than 100,000 marine mammals.

And not all plastic floats. Around 70 per cent of the junk sinks to the bottom, stifling the sea bed, killing organisms and messing with the food chain. In fact around 70 percent of discarded plastic sinks to the bottom. Dutch scientists have counted around 110 pieces of litter for every square kilometre of the seabed, a staggering 600,000 tonnes in the North Sea alone.

Our plastic waste poses a risk to our health too. What goes into the ocean goes into the food chain and eventually onto your dinner plate. Hundreds of millions of tiny plastic pellets, known as 'nurdles' - the raw materials for the plastic industry - are lost or spilled every year, working their way into the sea. These pollutants act as chemical sponges attracting man-made chemicals such as hydrocarbons and the pesticide DDT.

The North Pacific gyre is one of five major ocean gyres and it is possible that this Trash Vortex problem is one which is present in other oceans as well. The Sargasso Sea is a well known slow circulation area in the Atlantic, and research there has also demonstrated high concentrations of plastic particles present in the water.

Greenpeace warns that floating plastics can also affect marine ecosystems in yet another way: by providing a ready surface for organisms to live on. These plants and animals are then transported far outside their normal habitat to invade new habitats and become potential nuisance species.

('There have been pieces of plastic washed and dredged up that are more than 50 years old.')

More at www.greenpeace.org

 

that last bit about plastics effecting marine ecosystems was so vastly understated it makes me just want to give up and stay inland

plastic outweighs plankton in the oceans by about 10/1 these days
that means that marine organisms designed to filter plankton are getting about ten bits of plankton sized plastic for each actual bit of plankton they consume
they are in many cases starving to death in a sea of plastic fragments
the environmental toll is extraordinary

once upon a time
maybe twenty years ago
150 million green sea turtles swam in the gulf of Mexico
today
they are nearly extinct
why
they choked to death on plastic bags
the total volume of biomass of those turtles was the equivalant of every mammal on the continent of Africa
combined

yet the previous missive
for as good as it was
left it to the last paragraph and a mention of
nuisance species

we are the nuisance species kids
the day we learn that
is the day things start getting better around here

my sympathies to our kids
they are going to be really pissed off at us
when they figure out what we've done to this place
B

 

I do not take this serious.

There are plastic bags that have a lifespane of 1 month if wasted in the nature. Use rather them, than rising the taxes. The cost is close to zero. If you burn them, they release the C02 they holded up when they was made.

I live in Norway. A wannabe enviromental friendly country. We sell oil and gas, make big money. In order to lighten our conciousness, our politicans use cheap trix, like this plastic bag case.

Realy. How big problem is this plastic bag case? I cant see anyone flopin around in my country in the nature, or anywhere else for that mater. They are used to desposal of waste, almost to 95% in Norway.

To fix this "problem", use bio-degradeable plastic bags (yes they exist). Dont fool the public with stupid politic correctnes and raised taxes.

 

yes bio degradable plastic exists
it is seldom used and significantly more expensive
so
industry wont use it
and we end up stuck with immortal plastic

feel free to refute any or all portions of the following
I would be very interested in what you have to say

Plastic is made up of numerous petroleum based compounds, to produce 1 kg of Acrylic (PMMA, Polymethyl methacrylate) (23) 2 kg of petroleum is needed and up to 5 kg of toxic waist is generated (2,3). Plastic never breaks down but instead photo-degrades into some of the most hazardous petrochemical substances known to man (3,6,7,38). PMMA has an embodied energy of about 131.0MJ/kg with a density of 1180 kg/m3 (1,3,30). Although it is difficult to determine the exact production level of plastics per yr. 2007 estimates range from 100,000,000 to 205,000,000 tons (28,45) with an anual increase of 9.5% (45) 
100,000,000,000 plastic bags are used each year in the u.s. alone (10)
the U.S recovery (recycling) rate for all plastics in 2005 was 1% (3,5,8,10)
In 2007 World wide, less than 3% is recovered (3,5,8).
In an EPA ranking of the twenty chemicals whose production generates the most total hazardous waste, five of the top six are chemicals commonly used by the plastic industry. (10)
recycling one ton of plastic saves 1000 gallons of oil (10,32)

Plastic as it photo-degrades releases binders like Phthalates, Bisphenol A, Nonyphenols and PBDEs along with countless other known carcinogens and teratogens (3,16,21,25,32). Once the binders are released, plastic remains as a large molecule(3,17). Dioxins are created both during production and incineration (2,3,16,17,31,32,46) dioxins are the strongest carcinogen known to man (3,5,6.7,31,38), The number of harmful chemicals associated with the production of plastic are to numerous to mention in this comparison, however; just one a primary component of acrylics ( mainly polycarbonates ) is bisphenol A (BPA), a hormone disrupter, that releases into food and liquid at room temperature(3,16,17,21,), it is considered a teratogen along with thalidomide and is known to cause embryonic malformations (3.8.16). Phthalates have been shown to cause genital malformations
In 1999 Plastic waste had outweighed plankton in our oceans 6 to 1, by 2002 the number had risen to 10/1 (3,10,11,16,17). The north pacific gyre alone, has a density of 14.8 million visible pieces of floating plastic per square mile, over an area twice the size of texas (3,11). Thats 1.9 pieces of plastic such as, bottles, bottle caps, lighters, beach palls, plastic packaging or plastic aquariums for every square foot of ocean surface spanning an area of 537,202 square miles (3,11). This is only one of six mid ocean gyre systems polluted to this extent (39). These areas of floating plastic range in size from twice the size of Texas to the size of Africa (3,11).
Plastic appears to have a half life longer than most radioactive compounds (3) with its use being required by the epa as containment packaging for low grade nuclear waist disposal (33,43). Polyethylene has been approved for the long term disposal of liquid radioactive waist (3,40,41,42) ( of course they also approved glass, tar and concrete ). The long chain plastic molecule is so durable that its half life is still being researched.
Plastic virtually never breaks down in the environment beyond the molecular level (3,7,11). We are stuck with every piece of plastic ever created (11). Unless collected and incinerated there is no getting rid of it. Remanufacture is not effective in halting plastics from leaching contaminates into there surroundings. There is little debate over the adverse effects of plastics to the marine environment (ref-all not one dissenting opinion as to plastics harmful effect on the marine ecosystem ), Various forms of marine life, eat so much plastic, mistaking plastic fragments for plankton that it has decimated our ocean communities (10,11,15,16,17,44). Filter feeders unable to distinguish between plastic molecules and plankton, ingest and include millions of tons of plastics into the food chain (3,7,10,11,16,17,32,44), leading to the contamination and eventual starvation of countless organisms (3,10,11,16,17,32,44). 
 
additional comments 
the cost of collecting, destroying or remanufacturing Plastic (as most plastic is uneconomical to remanufacture) “must” be endured no mater how high because of plastics highly toxic and enduring nature; were as the recycling of glass can be safely limited to its economic viability with out adverse environmental effects, as long as source point gaseous emissions are controlled. The embodied energy of acrylic is over ten times that of glass, making it both an economically and environmentally unsound alternative (3,5,14,32). The environmental impact of glass is minimal (3,6,32,36,). 

references
1 ) Materials, geometry, and net energy ratio of tubular ...
2 ) http://www.mindfully.org/Berkeley/Berkeley-Plastics-Task-Force.htm
3 ) www.mindfully.org/Plastic/
4 ) measure of sustainability embodied energy
5 ) http://www.mindfully.org/Plastic/Best-Recycle-Plastic.htm
6 ) www.lotuslive.org/products/files/LLDrinkContainer01.pdf
7 ) www.fakeplasticfish.com/synthetic_sea_transcript.html
8 ) www.ecologycenter.org
9 ) Metro: Waste reduction fast facts: Glass
10 ) Metro: Waste reduction fast facts: Plastic
11 ) www.acfnewsource.org/environment/
12 ) www.fragmentsfromfloyd.com/ 2007/06/
13 ) NRC: Radioactive Waste
14 ) BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Warning on plastic's toxic threat
15 ) Keeping our ocean clean : Bradley Beach Today
16 ) Untitled Document
17 ) www.mountainfilm.org/downloads/docs/The_Plastic_Sea.pdf
18 ) www.visiongroup.co.uk/go.jsp?page=visiongroup_uk.compare comparison of glass and plastic
19 )http://www.firsttankguide.net/tanktype.php comparison of glass and acrylic
20 )www.stii.dost.gov.ph/pjsweb/data/decomposer.htm - 7k
21 ) http://archive.greenpeace.org/toxics/pvcdatabase/bad.html
22 ) http://www.epa.gov/chemfact/f_acrlac.txt
23 ) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polymethyl_methacrylate
24 ) http://www.freepatentsonline.com/5998554.html
25 ) http://www.npi.gov.au/database/substance-info/profiles/6.html
26 ) http://goalgreen.com/2007/06/25/plastic-the-gift-that-keeps-on-giving/
27 ) http://www.chemsoc.org/exemplarchem/entries/2004/bristol_whitehead/facts.htm
28 ) http://www.wasteonline.org.uk/resources/InformationSheets/Plastics.htm
29 ) www.level.org.nz
30 ) www.grisb.org/publications/pub33.htm - 24k -
31 ) http://www.environment.gov.au/settlements/publications/
32 ) GLASS vs. PLASTIC
33 ) RADIOACTIVE WASTE MANAGEMENT PROCEDURES FOR DUKE UNIVERSITY ...
34)http://www.devicelink.com/mpb/archi...esources/backissues/chemicals/acrylicacid.htm
35 ) Fact Sheets - Glass
36 ) ftp://ftp.dot.state.tx.us/pub/txdot-info/gsd/pdf/yrr_feb.pdf
37 ) Cullet Preheating: The Realistic Solution for All Glass Furnaces ...
38 ) Professional Environmental Solutions - Atlanta, Georgia
39 ) Patagonia Under Siege: The Plastic Killing Fields - Pacific Ocean ...
40 ) Composition and process for the encapsulation and stabilization of ...
41 ) APPENDIX D - Key Federal Laws and Regulations
42 ) Mixed-Waste Shipping & Transportation | Radiation Protection | US EPA
43 ) Low Level Radioactive Waste Information Page
44 ) DEP: Atlantic Green Sea Turtle Fact Sheet
45 ) Ulrich Reifenhäuser: Plastics and rubber have changed the world ...
46 ) Plastic Debris Washed Ashore
47 ) Bizarre Properties of Glass Revealed | LiveScience
48 ) Canada Likely to Label Plastic Ingredient ‘Toxic’ - New York Times

additional resources
http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/non-hw/muncpl/
http://www.americanplasticscouncil.org/s_apc/sec.asp?TrackID=&CID=343&DID=1110&VID=86
http://www.mindfully.org/Berkeley-Plastics-Task-Force.htm
http://www.designboom.com/eng/education/pet/recycling.html
http://americanplasticscouncil.org/s_apc/sec.asp
http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/non-hw/muncpl/glass.htm
http://www.epa.gov/grtlakes/seahome/housewaste/src/glass.htm
http://www.cityofmadison.com/streets/plastic.html

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Soto, A.M., Justica, H. Wray, J.W., Sonnenschein, C. p-Nonyl-phenol: an estrogenic xenobiotic released from "modified" polystyrene. Environ. Health Perspect. 92, 167-173 (1991).
 Sonnenschein, C; Soto, AM. An updated review of environmental estrogen and androgen mimics and antagonists. J. Steroid Biochem. & Molec. Biol. 65, 143-150 (1998).
Mato, Y., Isoibe, T., Takada, H., Kanehiro, H., Ohtake, C, Kaminuma, T. Plastic resin pellets as a transport medium for toxic chemicals in the marine environment. Environ. Sci. Technol. 35, 318-324 (2001).
Kelce, WR; Stone, CR; Laws, SC; Gray, LE; Kemppainen, JA; Wilson, EM. Persistent DDT metabolite p,p'-DDE is a potent androgen receptor antagonist. Nature 375, 581-585 (1995).
Sumpter, JP; Jobling, S. Vitellogenesis as a biomarker for estrogenic contamination of the aquatic environment. Environmental Health Perspectives 103, Suppl 7, 173-184 (1995).
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Kuiper, GGJM., Lemmen, J.G., Carlsson, B., Corton, J.C., Safe, S.H., van der Saag, P.T.,van der Burg, B., Gustafsson, J-A. Interaction of estrogenic chemicals and phytoestrogens with estrogen receptor ?. Endocrinology 139, 4252-4263 (1998).
Baker ME, Sklar DH, Terry LS, Hedges MR. Diethyl Pyrocarbonate, a histidine selective reagent, inhibits estrogen binding to receptor protein in rat uterus cytosol. Biochem. Int. 11, 233-238 (1985).
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Nagel, SC; vom Saal, FS; Welshons, WV. Developmental effects of estrogenic chemicals are predicted by an in vitro assay incorporating modification of cell uptake by serum. J. Steroid Biochem. & Molec. Biol. 69, 343-357 (1999).
Baker, M.E. Adrenal and sex steroid receptor evolution: environmental implications. J. Molec. Endocrinol. 26, 119-225 (2001). 
Bakun, A. and Weeks, S. (2004). Greenhouse gas buildup, sardines, submarine eruptions and the possibility of abrupt degradation of intense marine upwelling ecosystems Ecology Letters 7: 1015-1023.
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Weeks S. J., Currie B. and A. Bakun (2002). Satellite identification of massive hydrogen sulphide emissions in the southeastern Atlantic Ocean. Nature 415: 493-494.

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WOW - - Thanks Boston, I have bookmarked this as a key resource

 

its part of a paper I wrote a short while ago

comparing plastic to glass

its not the finish version and Im not sure I can even send you that as its looking like it will get published
I dont know if it will be public access or not so there are restrictions from the publishing house I must adhere to
but Im sure I can use the rough drafts

its one reason why; since I do actually get published from time to time,
that I was so pissed off at those other guys when they said they were going to write a paper on someone elses work
you just dont do that
ever
its about as low as it gets to hijack someone elses work like that
it flies in the face of every ethics consideration to do so
besides
cant you think of your own work
rather than "borrow" someone elses

 

What I have to say?

I have never said ordinary plastic bags are a good thing.

Here in Norway, a plastic bag at our mal cost like 0.2$. We can choose, a ordinary one, or a bio-degradeable plastic for 0.25$ That is not a "drastic" increase in price..

Solution is simple. Ban ordinary plastic bags.

Ofcourse it is hard to bring it out in life. So, you guys can use your strawbag or whatever, I choose the bio-degradeable and live happy