Cleaning Up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Global and Local Efforts to Remove Marine Trash

Jul 27, 2009

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is where many plastic bottles go once emptied and thrown away. Unfortunately that plastic is killing sea life. Its time to clean it up.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch was first discovered in 1997, but few efforts have been made to clean up this atrocity until recently. Representing the accumulated waste and carelessness of humanity, high concentrations of garbage are found in the Pacific Ocean covering an area two to three times the area of Texas. Some conjecture that this marine garbage dump is larger than the United States itself reports David Ferris in “Message in a Bottle” in the May/June 2009 issue of the Sierra Club’s magazine. Regardless of the size, plastics in the ocean are killing 100,000 marine mammals, a million birds, and plenty more fish each year. It is high time that humanity took responsibility for its actions and began cleaning up this mess.

Problems Encountered in Cleaning Up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Unfortunately, some experts say that cleaning up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is impossible. NOAA describes a few of the challenges under the “FAQ” section of its Marine Debris Program site. Much of the debris is below the surface of the water, making it sometimes difficult to see – despite the Patch’s large size. Further, the North Pacific Subtropical Convergence Zone (STCZ), where much of the garbage accumulates, shifts between 23° and 37° N latitude seasonally making the patch hard to follow. There is also a great risk of killing vast amounts of sea life by simply scooping the garbage out of the water. Marine life tends to congregate around the trash looking for food, and plenty of species are microscopic in size. Finally, and perhaps the biggest issue is the cost of cleaning up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. As of yet, removal is not cost-effective and some say it would cost more than any country’s budget to clean up the Patch.

Project Kasei and the Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Despite the challenges, efforts are finally being made to clean up the Trash Vortex in the Pacific Ocean. Project Kaisei plans to study what it calls the Plastic Vortex throughout the summer of 2009. Over several weeks a team of scientists, environmentalists, and sailors will study the Pacific Garbage Patch and test patented catch methods for removing the debris. If large volumes of plastic can be removed and processed, a full scale clean-up operation will begin with 18 months from the expedition’s end. Donations can be made at the Project Kaisei website.

Although these large scale projects are important in minimizing the damage already done, change must be enacted on land to prevent the ocean’s Plastic Vortex from getting larger. Oceanographer Charles Moore, the man who found and publicized the Great Pacific Ocean Patch, emphasizes the importance of reducing consumption on land. In a speech he gave for the TED Conference in California in February 2009, he illustrates the destruction plastics inflict on marine life. Americans purchase 2 million plastic bottles every five minutes, and most of the bottles end in the ocean where the caps are eaten by birds and fish who subsequently die. Reducing plastic consumption on land is not as hard as it may seem and is vital to conservation efforts.

Beach Clean Up Days

Another way to help reduce the Great Pacific Ocean Patch is by cleaning up local coastlines, thus preventing trash from traveling further into the ocean. Many conservation groups organize beach cleanup days. Participate in the annual International Coastal Cleanup by signing up at the Ocean Conservancy. The next International Coastal Cleanup will be on September 19, 2009.

The copyright of the article Cleaning Up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in Marine Conservation is owned by Megan Jungwi. Permission to republish Cleaning Up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.