NEWS: It's a Plastic Fantastic World!

I had no idea...I mean I knew about the other pollution problems that get press...but this really just makes me sick. Thanks for the heads up Flux! -- And by the way I love the new Obama catch-phrase

Well that gives some potential insight into the collapse of the fisheries too. I think we may be heartbeats away form some stunning ecocsystem collapse. Good article Flux!

I'd be interested to see sources there. Partly because what you're proposing is plastic-eating bacteria (which would be very interesting and potentially a considerable problem); partly because if you're right then the bacteria will spread very rapidly, since nothing is able to eat them.

Fisheries collapse is almost certainly due primarily to over-fishing. Though the chance of carbon-dioxide-driven ocean acidification looks like a potential global catastrophe.

i didnt know about it, but im not at all surprised. one more example, if we needed one, that Man has touched (and polluted) every square inch of this planet. sadness.

nice article Flux, thanks!

I'm too lazy to find a source, but the last time the pacific garbage blob came up on NPR they brought up the same idea. The only reason we have coal now is because ages ago there were no bacteria that could break down wood, so wood that got buried would sit there and turn into coal. Some scientists figure that eventually bacteria will learn to eat plastic the same way it learned to eat wood.

I did know about it, and its pretty disturbing- maybe recycling will do some good if everyone does it but
I have got to think that the fast food business is behind a lot of this...I know I can fill a trash can a week with debris from that source that I pick up out of my yard, and lot at work...
With oil prices where they are, does it make sense to harvest all of that processed oil and use it it?
And now onto something else disturbing...Tech Trash

coyotemike said:
People might as well stop having kids, because there isn't going to be anything left for them to eat, drink, or breathe.

SPOILERS! (Click to view)

yeah, I know I'm exagerating, but if sometimes feels like it

Clearly the Bisphenol A will solve that for us as with enough build-up of it, we won't be able to reproduce anyway.

I am hopeful we will begin to solve this problem in earnest before we get to that point. I do not think we can wait for the unencumbered free market system to foster it.

Like all our other environmental vagaries, it will take political will to fix this:

1)Stop all disposal of plastic and/or replace plastics where possible with alternative "plastic like" materials (i.e. potato/corn starch cutlery/straws and corn "styrofoam") and by mandating recycling with legislation.

2)Support technology that recycles all plastic into reusable commodities, i.e. more plastic or in the case of thermal depolymerization and similar technologies- oil. Plastic eating microbes are also a possibility.

3) Develop filtering systems that will remove plastic from the world's oceans when it washes up on beaches.

I once volunteered for one of those wetland clean-ups near the Berkeley marina, and the one item I saw (and picked up) the most, more than any other piece of refuse detritus that day, were the plastic straws that every fast food restaurant serves up with its drinks. From that day forward, I vowed I would never use another unnecessary straw again.

Of course, as I type this, there is a soft drink in a cup with a straw protruding from it, sitting right next to me on my desk (mocking my resolve and scrutinizing my ability, or rather the lack thereof, to break old habits). So, I think the ultimate culprits in Earth's destruction, more than the fast food industry itself, are the people like me who patron those joints and are too inept to lift a drink that extra two inches to their big, fat, lazy, idiot mouths.

Ragnarök or Bust, yo.

I read about this plastic garbage barge some time ago, and ever since I've vastly reduced the amount of plastic I use (and I recycle whatever's recyclable). Still, I had this drinking-straw addiction. I found Pyrex drinking straws on ebay, and they're fabulous. They're sturdy and dishwasher safe, and I usually carry one in my purse or tote like a crazy person. There are also bamboo and stainless steel straws...the bamboo ones are fun as a novelty, but I don't advise using them unless you like all your drinks to taste like tree bark.

This is one of the saddest and most disgusting things I have ever read. I've never even heard of this before! Wow.
Just shows how much humans as a species are.

That Simpson's fish with the three eyes will soon be a reality..

Seriously, though ... I had no freakin' clue.
Another great article, Flux.

The Pacific Gyre is only one part of the whole story. Every year, coastal waters are prone to periods of hypoxia (low oxygen) and poisoning caused by harmful algal blooms. Since the beginning of monitoring the blooms, biologists have discovered them in ever increasing frequency, size and duration. HAB's are likely caused by pollution of the freshwater ways that feed into the ocean. Nitrogen-rich run off from over-fertilized fields and sewage combines with warmer temperatures and sunlight are believed to trigger the rapid reproduction of algae, robbing the surrounding water of available oxygen, producing harmful bio-toxins and filtering out sunlight all in one fell swoop. These "blooms" often kill all life in the effected area and can poison others that feed on the carcasses of the deceased. But these killer "tides" aren't the worst of it...

Enter the ocean " creeping dead zones". Further away from the coastline, vast tracts seabed are becoming the depositories for killer slime-filled muck. Anoxic regions (without oxygen) occur naturally in the ocean, but they've been steadily growing and humans are yet again the culprit. Polluted runoff is carried out to sea where the nutrient-rich water feeds the rapid population growth of phytoplankton (sound familiar?) While photosynthesis occurs in the phytoplankton near the surface, the surrounding becomes saturated with oxygen. However, the oxic waters do not spread throughout the environment to benefit the rest of life as would be the norm. In fact, it robs the ocean of oxygen and life. Clouds of organic sediment from the phytoplankton settle to the sea floor, feeding bacteria at the bottom. The surface blooming results in a bottom blooming of bacteria, using up the oxygen and replacing it with carbon dioxide during respiration. These areas have been creeping, following currents into choked and restricted waterways, killing all life within the zone.

There seem to be several key factors involved with the depletion of ocean life - climate change, pollution & over-harvesting among them. Oh I could go on... I could talk about coral bleaching due to increased water temperature and sedimentary pollution (yet again). I could continue on with the destruction of entire aquatic hydrosphere due to the over harvesting of beneficial species (not to mention the certain methods of destructive harvesting, i.e. drift netting, use of chemicals to "stun fish" for use in aquariums, displacement and extinction caused by the introduction of non-native species, the list goes on...) Unfortunately, I don't think many people are as aware of the ecological disaster that is taking place. Sadly, there are those that choose to ignore, deny or be willfully ignorant of the truth...

Ah, that was a bit misleading on my part. I was referring to the fuel-eating bacterias which are breaking down petroleum in their digestions. Although I have no way of guessing how long it would take, I would still think you would need the amount of time for speciation (even for bacteria that's still a pretty long time) to account for the petroleum in a different form.

Well, somebody's got to start over, right? So millions of years from now, the sentient methane-breathing petroleum-metabolizing "top" lifeforms on the planet will argue whether Xegnax created all life and an "Earth" to go with it, or whether life developed the way it did to account for the environment.

A strange dude named Loki invited me to it, actually. He said Ragnarök would be a huge party, with lots of booze and naked valkyries.

Japanese scientists did, in fact, discover a nylon eating bacteria in the 1970's, which is assumed to be an example of a beneficial mutation that happened in a relatively short period of time.

Since mutation is essentially a random occurrence in response to certain stimuli, we hopefully may not have to wait a million years for other plastic-eating bacteria to occur.

Great article, Flux, One of those undeniable signs of our effect on the planet that can't be explained away as part of the natural cycle.

OK, thank you. I suspect that speciation may happen quite a bit faster than that, at least in bacteria, but I have no proof. That was part of my interest.

Soon be a reality? Hell I caught that fish in Saylorville Reservoir about three years ago- and oddly haven't been back to fish there again

commonman posted a very helpful link that would suggest you are correct about it taking far less time than my (scientifically amateur) estimate would have had.

Honestly, at this point in my life I'm non-anthrocentric enough to view viruses and bacterium inheriting the earth (lol) as a definite silver lining. It's the "out" response for the almost unavoidable cynicism that results from reading news like this.

On straw laziness: they used to be paper, which you can actually still get from some companies, but the novelty of straws that didn't flatten or just get saturated is apparently now a cultural component.

Unfair to pigs.

Exactly. And thank you (both) for the link.

The problem with the unconscious inheriting the earth is exactly what it seems to be: bacteria will never love Mozart,or Escher, or know what a joke is. Humans are unique (as far as we can tell ) and we should be paying more attention to what really makes us unique. For instance, the capacity to evade "survival of the fittest"; in business, or elsewhere.