The plastic plague: Can our oceans be saved from environmental ruin?

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Summarizing

The plastic plague: Can our oceans be saved from environmental ruin?

The summary of the article we’re overviewing is by Kieron Monks for CNN and was published on the 2nd of September 2016.

This article is concentrating on the impacts created from plastics on the Pacific Ocean. Plastic pollution has become one of the most pressing environmental issues and most visible, ironically saying when 750,000 pieces per square kilometer of microplastic have been found by researchers when photodegrades under sunlight. These plastics are yet not being able to recycle due to their different forms and shapes. The spiral currents from the gyre has distributed the marine waste deeply throughout the ocean in which would be impossible to remove all the microscopic pieces of plastics.

In addition, the number of plastics expected by 2020 can exponentially increase up to 7.25 tons but many of these additives can extend the life of products which attracts toxins with some estimates ranging to at least 79 000 years to break down.

This only leads us to majors drawbacks which are plastic health crises and the damage cost by plastic pollution. For example, in Tavalu, the population are not only expose to inhale but ingest the pollution due to the lack of infrastructure to get rid of the plastic being imported. The burning of plastic is another way to discard piles of plastics which causes cancer and other diseases where 7 out of 30 islanders are exposed to. Furthermore, studies have shown seaborne plastic being consumed by fishes and then consumed by humans as a warning of causing tumors.

Besides, the plastic is exposed to one third of the planet due to the gyres. These zones are not discharge by an economic zone and no concern then consequently makes fish consume the microscopic pieces of plastic and lead to expeditious and fatal escalation up to one million sea creatures per year and causes in total $13 billions of damage the marine habitats in which overwhelm fishing, shipping and tourism sectors.

However, a partnership called Global Partnership on Marine Litter provides a unique mechanism to bring together all actors such as policymakers, conservationists and business interests to prevent marine litter, disposable plastic and microplastics, with the aim of sharing knowledge and experience and advancing solutions to this pressing global issue.

In order to narrow the amount of plastic the production of it needs to decrease which puts down to an idea of charging consumers for plastic bags, developing biodegradable form of plastic or making deposits for plastic bottles.

Along the way innovations and technologies are parts of improving and protecting the ecosystems and workers in which the circular economy concepts is about an economic system aimed at eliminating waste and the continual use of resources. 

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