Tag: ocean plastic

Seagrass and Plastic Are Not Friends

8/28/2024 - By Sean Mowbray. The year 2021’s hopeful optimism is 2024’s unfortunate reality. In 2021, what sounded like a good news story hit the media: in the Mediterranean, seagrasses were trapping plastic waste, capturing fragments in their leaves and locking microplastics in seafloor sediments. The news cycle was spurred by a study… SEE MORE

Discarded Fishing Gear Repurposed into Cables

5/12/2024 - By Carli Stewart. It's a staggering fact that approximately 1 million tons of abandoned, lost, and discarded fishing gear (ALDFG) find their way into the world’s oceans every year. This ALDFG significantly threatens marine life, primarily contributing to ocean plastic pollution. ABB Installation Products, a company helping with the environmental crisis, has… SEE MORE

Mussel Poop May Help Clear Oceans of Microplastics

7/6/2023 - By science.org. One of the most widespread pollutants in the ocean is also one of the hardest to see. Trillions of tiny particles of plastic—known as microplastics—can clog the intestines of fish, destroy the tissues of marine creatures, and cause entire populations to decline. Their small size also makes them… SEE MORE

A piece of plastic debris that’s been colonized by both costal barnacles (pink and striped) and a gooseneck barnacle from the open ocean. (Linsey Haram/SERC Marine Invasions Lab)

This floating ocean garbage is home to a surprising amount of life from the coasts

5/15/2023 - By Nell Greenfieldboyce. Scientists studying a giant collection of plastic trash floating in the middle of the open ocean have found some unexpected inhabitants: dozens of marine species that usually stick close to the coast. Among the plastic debris, the researchers found all kinds of nonnative species, from anemones to… SEE MORE

A West Coast First: Water Wheel Trash Collector

Coastal News

6/19/2022 - By Erica I. Ritchie. Newport Beach is set to be the first city on the West Coast to turn to a relatively low-tech, autonomous water wheel system to scoop trash headed toward Upper Newport Bay, the harbor and the ocean. The California Coastal Commission commended the city for its plan… SEE MORE

https://apnews.com/article/science-health-business-environment-recycling-e40323953e5adffb32f73b60c9bb2202

Science Report: US Should Make Less Plastic to Save Oceans

12/5/2021 - By Seth Borenstein. America needs to rethink and reduce the way it generates plastics because so much of the material is littering the oceans and other waters, the National Academy of Sciences says in a new report. The United States, the world’s top plastics waste producer, generates more than 46… SEE MORE

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/19/climate/plastic-ocean-animals.html?a

These Items in Your Home Are Harming America’s Sea Animals

11/20/2020 - By Catrin Einhorn. How severely the world’s plastic waste crisis is affecting marine wildlife is not fully understood, despite decades of research and gruesome images of whales’ bellies filled with plastic and a turtle with a straw lodged in its nostril. A new report by Oceana, a conservation group, illustrates some of what we know… SEE MORE

All-Female Sailing Voyage to Study Ocean Microplastics

4/22/2020 - By Kelly Vaughan. An estimated eight million metric tons of plastic enter the ocean each year. Scientists believe that by the year 2050, there will be more plastic particles in the ocean than fish by weight. Needless to say, the plastic problem is catastrophic to our environment and is one that won't go away… SEE MORE