By thedihedral Posted on

Plastic Pollution in The Pacific Ocean

Picture yourself on your dream cruise across the pacific. When I first dreamt of exploring the islands I thought of tropical beaches, white sand, and blue oceans as far as the eye could see. I still dream about getting to explore all of it one day, but for very different reasons.

Hi, my name is Sebastião Appleton Figueira, but feel free to call me Seabass. I am an (enthusiastic) amateur climber, and international Ocean Engineering student at Texas A&M from Lisbon, Portugal.

I first decided to get involved with Ocean Engineering while I was living in Houston, TX. In 2017, the city was rocked by Hurricane Harvey and my friends and family suffered the consequences. I spent the majority of that year clearing out people’s houses and garages, getting rid of mold, and watching the city slowly rebuild. It was impressive to see a community and a country come together to solve a problem, but I knew that elsewhere in the world the same would not always happen. My attention turned to the impoverished coastal communities of the world that are already feeling the effects of climate change, and I knew there and then that I wanted to get to work. I still want to visit the Pacific Ocean, but my plans have shifted from a nice relaxing beach vacation to a few years of intense work to fix issues that are drastically affecting the smaller islands and their ecosystems, though they had little to no part in creating them.

Let’s bring our attention back to the cruise ship as we leave the port of L.A. and set sail deep into the pacific. If we were to take a shortcut through the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre on our way to Hawaii, here is what we would find from the perspective of the Captain who first came across it.

“… As I gazed from the deck at the surface of what ought to have been a pristine ocean, I was confronted, as far as the eye could see, with the sight of plastic.
It seemed unbelievable, but I never found a clear spot. In the week it took to cross the subtropical high, no matter what time of day I looked, plastic debris was floating everywhere: bottles, bottle caps, wrappers, fragments.”

Capt. Charles Moore

Today I want to talk about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The Patch is an accumulation of plastic waste comprising the Western Garbage Patch, located near Japan, and the Eastern Garbage Patch, located between the U.S. states of Hawaii and California. Combined, the plastic debris is at least twice the size of Texas and can be seen from space, although denser debris can sink centimeters or even several meters beneath the surface, making the vortex’s area nearly impossible to measure.

One of the things that we should focus on is that most of the plastic on the Patch comes from plastic bags, bottle caps, plastic water bottles, and Styrofoam cups. All typical household items in the U.S. and each and everyone taxable under the Plastic Cap Challenge rules. This debris is very harmful to the gyre’s ecosystem. Loggerhead sea turtles mistake plastic bags for jellies, albatrosses and other seabirds mistake smaller particles for fish eggs and feed them to their chicks, and seals and other marine mammals often drown entangled in abandoned fishing nets.

I know it may seem like a long shot to think something as small as a Plastic Cap can tackle a problem of this magnitude, but the pollution in the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre is too large and complex to be picked up by nets. Because of this, scientists and explorers agree that limiting or eliminating our use of disposable plastics and replacing them with biodegradable sources is the best way to clean up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

My roommates and I have started working on it, a little bit at a time. We compost, recycle, and try to be as ecologically friendly as a group of guys in college can be. As someone who wants to spend their life fixing the problems that cause and are caused by climate change, I know that a lot of these issues can seem daunting, but, at the end of the day, any little thing you do now may make my job easier in the future. That, I believe, is a challenge worth taking on.

Good luck sticking to a greener lifestyle this month, and climb on.

Best,

Seabass

Seabass’ special documentary suggestion: A Life on Our Planet – David Attenborough

35 Replies to “Plastic Pollution in The Pacific Ocean”

    1. Seabass Appleton Figueira says: Reply

      Thank you! Just hoping to bring a little more awareness to the issues I care about.

      Liked by 4 people

      1. MousumiSays says:

        If we can work so diligently to keep our houses clean why not for our own and only earth. A neat, tidy and greener planet must constitute our legacy to our future progeny.

        Liked by 2 people

  10. Rolfe DH says: Reply

    Pretty shocking images. However, I live near beaches along the Atlantic coast in North Carolina, USA. I see practically no plastic trash on our beaches here. We’re far from eco-conscious in this region, so I have to give credit to our waste systems for making sure this waste doesn’t end up in the oceans and on the beaches. These systems came about from a variety of social and political beliefs and practices. They must also be sustained. Positive change is possible.

    Liked by 4 people

      1. Rolfe DH says:

        Yes indeed. My point is that there is a lot we can and must do to control it at the source. Other places I’ve lived dispose of waste in the ocean, or have no waste disposal systems, and it shows up on the local beaches.

        Liked by 2 people

  12. Microvist Tobias says: Reply

    It’s horrifying to see just how massive the great pacific garbage patch is. Even more so that this is just one spot we know about and there’s even more out there in other patches and washed up on remote beaches. Sounds like you’re doing great stuff to make a difference and hope more and more people are inspired to challenge themselves too.

    Liked by 4 people

  14. Cheryl, Gulf Coast Poet says: Reply

    Seabass, All the best in your future career! You will be doing very important work. Expect to come up against interests motivated by greed and politics. It will take wide awareness and many people committed to environmental issues to solve our problems. Information, such as your post, needs to always be in front of the public. ❤

    Liked by 1 person

  15. Pingback: Plastic Pollution in The Pacific Ocean – smartgaslk
  18. Shane Harty says: Reply

    Good article sir! I will share on my LinkedIn profile. Have you read ‘Climate Crisis and the Global Green New Deal’ by Noam Chomsky and Robert Pollin? Take care, keep writing!

    Liked by 1 person

  19. Miles Quinn says: Reply

    I completely agree that we should all be reducing our consumption of single use items whenever possible! But I can’t help but wonder if it’s plastic itself that’s the problem. For example wouldn’t a reusable plastic bottle be one of the best things to use? Low carbon footprint and resilient to breaking. Only through reducing our consumption we can drive down our total waste production.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. thedihedral says: Reply

      Even better would be reusable low carbon based bottles. It’s a big ask for re-useable bottles though. When you look at something like Coke/Pepsi consumption, the small efforts we make as consumers will have such little impact until corporations have a motive to change. Unfortunately most corporations are not driven by environmentalism but rather profitable consumerism. Refillable coke/pepsi/pop/juice bottles would be a great 1st step!

      Thanks for the awesome comment Miles!

      Like

  20. Sunny Side Up says: Reply

    Very interesting read. In my job as a child support worker we have been doing online activities with the children to draw attention to the utterly dismal way we treat our planet (we don’t usually word it like that haha). One of the activiites was to get them to collect all of the single use plastic they used in one week to make an eco brick. I did it too. Oh. My. God! So much plastic. This really is a message we need to get out before we completely destroy the world we live in.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. thedihedral says: Reply

      That assignment is so cool. What a great way to bring awareness! Thanks for sharing this project, I need to think of a way to incorporate it with the people I know!

      Like

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