World's Biggest Dump

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch and the Problem with Plastics

By Femke Oldham

What lurks in the deepest depths of the Pacific Ocean? It isn't a razor-toothed shark or a venomous eel waiting to strike. It is far more dangerous than that. In a place where few humans have traveled, our old footballs, Coke bottles, Lego blocks, and other trash is swirling around in a giant toxic soup, poisoning and strangling the marine life in its path. Called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, this beast is more than three times the size of California and weighs a hundred million tons. It is the largest garbage dump in the world.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch has been growing rapidly since the 1950s due to wind and current patterns that pick up trash from the shore and trap it in a swirling vortex five hundred nautical miles off the California coast, between San Francisco and Hawaii. About eighty percent of the Garbage Patch is made up of plastic that leaches harmful toxins into the marine ecosystem and will never biodegrade.

Scientists at the Long Beach, California-based Algalita Marine Research Foundation have been studying the ocean's plastic problem for over ten years. In their numerous voyages to sea, they have documented the dire effects on marine life caused by plastic pollution. More than a million birds and 100,000 marine mammals and sea turtles die every year from eating or getting entangled in plastic. Researchers have found sea birds starved to death, their bellies full of cigarette lighters and bottle caps they ingest while feeding in trash-filled waters.

Each year, hundreds of million of tiny pieces of plastic called "nurdles" or "mermaid tears" are dumped into the ocean or lost at sea (approximately 60 billion pounds of nurdles are manufactured annually in the U.S. alone). Nurdles look just like fish eggs and act as sponges for dangerous chemicals like hydrocarbons and DDT. Scientists have determined that plastic actually outweighs zooplankton (a critical food source for many smaller marine creatures) by as much as six to one in many parts of the ocean.

The dangerous effects of this plastic pollution are not limited to the middle of the Pacific. As marine animals consume drinking straws, plastic bag fragments, and nurdles, toxic chemicals seep into their biological tissues. These toxic creatures work their way up the food chain and eventually end up on our dinner plates. Unfortunately, the bad news doesn't stop there. Algalita scientists have also grimly concluded that there is not much hope for cleaning up this mess. The Garbage Patch lies outside the jurisdiction of any single country, necessitating major international cooperation to clean it up.

Harold Hedelman, The Watershed Project's clean shoreline proponent, says, "Our single-use mentality and our 'out of sight, out of mind' relationship towards human waste, especially garbage, is threatening the survival of our Bay and ocean." Captain Charles Moore, founder of the Algalita Marine Research Foundation, agrees. He is a strong advocate for raising public awareness about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch and suggests that citizens start taking responsibility for this problem. State legislators are showing signs of agreement as well. There are currently three bills in the California State Assembly that address the plastic pollution issue, including a fee on single-use plastic bags. However, Hedelman warns that the implementation of this sort of policy may be, "a very long time coming."

In the meantime, raising awareness is crucial. The work of The Watershed Project's marine debris program is a necessary first step to build a public commitment to sharp reductions in plastic pollution. If more people recall the toxic trash soup swirling in the ocean when the grocery store bagger asks, "Paper or plastic," a steadier course to a cleaner ocean can be laid.

Find out ten easy ways to reduce your plastic footprint.