The solution to pollution is not dilution!

The oceans cover over 71% of the Earths surface, their vast size and depth meant that until recently the major paradigm of thought was that 'the solution to pollution is dilution'. 

Fergusson, of the Council of the British Plastics Federation, stated in 1974 that ‘‘plastics litter is a very small proportion of all litter and causes no harm to the environment except as an eyesore’’. It wasn't until Laist (1987) recognised plastic debris as harmful to marine life, that environmental science moved its eye from the terrestrial sphere to the hydrosphere.

In hind sight the old 'dilution' policy seems rather short sighted, given the rapid increases in population and consumerism of the late 20th century (Pollution, 2015).

Regardless of the sheer scale of the world's oceans plastic pollution is now a ubiquitous component of marine areas, due to the materials buoyancy and durability. The long decomposition rates of plastics present very serious risks as large quantities can accumulate and remain within the oceans on decadal to centennial timescales.

The longevity, abundance and robustness of the material has led to marine plastic pollution being described as ''one of the most serious emerging threats to marine biodiversity'' by the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD, 2015)

Consuming plastic

'The plastic age heralded the world free from moths and rust and full of colour... nations more independent from natural resources' (Yarsley & Couzens, 1945).

I never thought that I'd research the history of plastics during a degree in Geography, but here I find myself with 12 google chrome tabs open with varying titles from 'Plastic Statistics' to 'A European History of Plastic'. Knowledge of the evolution in the production, content and in particular the disposal of plastic seems extremely prevalent to understanding the impacts that plastic has on the worlds oceans.

Given that plastics are a purely modern phenomena the material has a relatively short history, but regardless of time the scope of its impact on the modern world is huge.

The first recordings of plastics in use refer to the use of natural materials such as rubber gum and cellulose in the 1820s. From its origins in natural materials plastic evolved to the earliest synthetics between 1900-1929, where pre modern plastics were recognised as long chain molecules (an element of extreme significance when considering plastics decomposition times). From the 1930s plastic emerged as a leading world industry, given its versatility and inexpensive production costs it revolutionised most industries. Use of plastic material is evident in all industries, spreading in consumption across the world.

As can be seen in figure 1 during the 20th century the production and demand of plastic increased exponentially, coinciding with humanity's increase in population and consumption. Contemporary production of plastics provide for a wide variety of markets and an even wider variety of products. Global production of plastics rose to 288 million tonnes in 2012, a 2.8% increase compared to the statistics of 2011.

(Figure 1. graph courtesy of Plastics Europe)

So if plastic is used to produce mostly everything, what happens to it when its no longer of use to us? When you upgrade your ipod? When jelly shoes goes out of fashion? When your trusty Asda shopping bag gets a tear in rendering it a completely useless sheet of orange plastic?

This will be followed up in the following blog...

Let's talk trash: discourse in the media concerning marine pollution

Environmental issues have long been considered hot topics in global media, however the marine environment is rarely discussed. Media tends to focus on the more tangible terrestrial environment that which we can relate to. My primary example for comparison here is the sheer volume of articles relating to the fate of Cecil the lion. The global attention and environmentalism inspired by the loss of a single organism from a single species is astounding.

When it comes to the marine environment, an entire sphere of the Earth, global media seems reluctant to discuss it.

Recently the issue of plastic in the worlds oceans has been exposed by global media, highlighting what many marine scientists discovered as early as the 1970s (CNN, 2014). This shift in media focus only came as a response to the recent downings of airplanes in the oceans, when satellite driven searches mistook vast areas of marine pollution as 'sighted debris' of the wreckages hindering search attempts. Plastic pollution has remained for some time since at the forefront of media, with Time Magazine and other newspapers releasing articles concerning the issue (Time Magazine, 2015) .

This isn't the first time that the scale of plastic pollution has been written about in the fish eye focus of popular media. Captain Charles Moore has been writing and campaigning about the problem since discovering the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in 1997 (Algalita, 2015). He has since explored more than 40,000 miles of the North Pacific Ocean, highlighting its plight to the media. The following video from TED.com illustrates Moore's research.

From messages in bottles to fields of plastic: welcome

Hello and welcome to my blog discussing humanities pollution of the worlds oceans.

We rely on the worlds oceans for a variety of reasons. They regulate our climate, they give us oxygen, they give us food. But we've turned our oceans into a plastic trash can.

This blog will investigate mans affect on the hydrosphere, with particular emphasis on the role of plastics based pollution. During the course of this blog I hope to discuss a range of subtopics: pollution variation, environmental concerns, ecological concerns, current management schemes and future predictions.

Humanities domination over the Earth system began on a global scale with the onset of the Industrial Revolution. During this time capitalism emerged, production yields intensified, populations expanded and consumerism developed. Mans exploitation of the Earth's resources was unprecedented, as was his ingenuity and his environmental pollution.

Presently the range of pollutants that humanity produces increases with each new invention. During the 1960s and 70s pollution in the worlds oceans was dominated by pesticides and herbicides, in the 1980s and 90s it was polluted by horrendous oil spills (Popularmechanics, 2015). 

Now there is one main pollutant which is having astronomically detrimental affects on the worlds oceans...

Plastic. 

Plastic based products have only been in production for around 60 years and so their effects as oceanic pollutants have a brief history. But that is not to say that the physical dimension of the problem is small, as plastics account for 60% of all marine debris and affect every ocean on the planet. On a temporal scale plastics are predicted to remain within the ocean for between 10-100 years due to the plastics durability and non biodegradable properties. 

Plastic pollution within the oceans has detrimental results for marine environments, with a range of affects, from creating marine 'dead zones' spanning tens of kilometres, to individually affecting marine fauna. Within science there is a general consensus that the increased levels of plastic pollution have lead to a number of species becoming endangered. Thus, humanities corruption of the Earth system has lead to some rather drastic suggestions that we are creating the 'great sixth extinction phase' (The Guardian, 2015).

See video below for an introduction of the proposed topic (Video courtesy of the US Department of State).