Category Archives: News

We require a Global Plastic Agreement with a wider scope than usually envisioned, state multiple authors

This Science paper follows the February 2021, fifth meeting of the United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA) where multiple governments spoke in favor of an international agreement to combat plastic pollution by finding a binding global agreement to address the life cycle of plastics.  A holistic view of the problem is required

The report underlines that the international community has tended to view the plastics problem from a predominantly ocean-focused and waste-centered perspective. This view does not take into account that plastics are increasingly found in all environments, such as terrestrial ecosystems and the atmosphere, as well as the human biology, including lungs and placenta.

The co-authors, one of which is IUCN’s Joao Sousa, all argue for a new international legally binding agreement that addresses the entire life cycle of plastics, from extraction of raw materials to legacy plastic pollution. Only by taking this approach can efforts match the magnitude and transboundary nature of this escalating problem and its social, environmental and economic impacts.

The core goals of a plastics agreement 

The report gives three goals to anchor a solid agreement with action at its core: 

Minimise virgin plastics production and consumption
Facilitate safe circularity of plastics
Eliminate plastic pollution in the environment.

Reasons for the three core goals’ are explained,as are preparations for achieving them, subsequent actions and limitations, supporting mechanisms and means for tracking progress. 

The Science magazine report can be read here

Plastic Waste Management Hazards: Waste-to-Energy, Chemical Recycling, and Plastic Fuels

Plastic waste has become an unprecedented pollution issue around the globe. From visible plastic litter on land and in oceans to invisible microplastics in lakes, mountains, and rain, the planet is increasingly blanketed in the petrochemical remnants of plastic production. With petrochemical companies avoiding fossil fuel carbon liabilities by massively increasing plastic production, the amount of plastic waste generated is set to climb dramatically. This report examines the current and emerging methods by which plastic waste is managed globally and questions whether any of them present a solution to the rapidly accelerating generation of plastic waste. The short answer is that recycling at the margins cannot provide a solution to plastic pollution when plastic production is set to grow exponentially. Other ‘recovery’ waste management techniques such as incineration, plastic to fossil fuel, and downcycling to incorporate plastic waste in roads, will simply generate more pollution. The only long-term answer to plastic pollution is to produce less plastic. This seems unlikely while the petrochemical industry needs plastic as a safe haven from its carbon liabilities. Increasing plastic production offsets falling demand for its fossil fuels.

Ban the bag | Surfrider Foundation Europe

Have more than one trick in your bagReuse your bags to limit their impact. Slip your reusable bags into your purse, car, gym bag so that you always have reusable bags with you. By doing this, you will contribute to a circular economy that respects the environment.Adopt your new reusable bagWicker baskets, shopping nets, tote bags, etc., many sustainable alternatives exist and are now available to everyone. Not only ecological, but use them to make a statement about your commitment to the planet.Surfrider tote bag

Study suggests bacteria in cow’s stomach can break down plastic

Plastics Study suggests bacteria in cow’s stomach can break down plastic Scientists find micro-organisms from the bovine stomach have ability to degrade polyesters in lab setting Natalie Grover @NatalieGrover Fri 2 Jul 2021 05.14 EDT Last modified on Fri 2 Jul 2021 06.00 EDT Bacteria found in one of the compartments of a cow’s stomach …

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Call for global treaty to end production of ‘virgin’ plastic by 2040

A binding global treaty is needed to phase out the production of “virgin” or new plastic by 2040, scientists have said. The solution to the blight of plastic pollution in the oceans and on land would be a worldwide agreement on limits and controls, they say in a special report in the journal Science. Since …

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Could plastic-eating microbes take a bite out of the recycling problem?

<!– –> Plastic trash recovered from an island in the South Pacific Ocean shows decay and bite marks from marine life. Mandy Barker By Warren CornwallJul. 1, 2021 , 2:00 PM Muhammad Reza Cordova is searching for treasure amid the water bottles, plastic bags, and plastic foam cups that choke the beaches, reefs, and mangrove …

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Researchers are now using hurricane-tracking satellites to combat ocean microplastics



Have you ever wondered how scientists even begin to study things like patterns in ocean pollution and movements of microplastics? Better yet, you can probably imagine the people working the hardest to fight these problems could benefit from useful information like being able to track where a majority of microplastics come from in the first place? Surprisingly, initial methods to keep tabs on such things rely on reports from plankton trawlers, according to a new report from the University of Michigan, and those same researchers have introduced the use of some far more advanced machinery for their work: satellites.
The new tracking method employed by the UM team is taking data from a system of eight micro-satellites that were launched in 2016 to track storms. Creating measurements for what they’re calling “ocean surface roughness,” they were able to find a correlation between radar measurements used to track wind speed and the existing data from plankton trawlers and ocean current models already used to predict the movement of microplastics.
“Areas of high microplastic concentration, like the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, exist because they’re located in convergence zones of ocean currents and eddies. The microplastics get transported by the motion of the water and end up collecting in one place,” says Chris Ruf, the Frederick Bartman Collegiate Professor of Climate and Space Science at UM. “Surfactants behave in a similar way, and it’s very likely that they’re acting as sort of a tracer for the microplastics.”Advertisement
One of the team’s headline-making findings with this new tracking method is that concentrations of microplastics in a body of water can vary by season. For example, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch shrinks to its smallest size in January, the thick of the Northern Hemisphere winter. Six months later, microplastic concentrations are at their highest in the exact same region come summer. Meanwhile, the same cycle is flipped in the Southern Hemisphere. The researchers’ hope is that straightforward data like this can direct an organization like the Ocean Cleanup, helping them know when and where to deploy their resources. The same discovery also helped UM researchers narrow down some of the greatest sources of microplastic flow into the ocean, like China’s Yangtze River.
“It’s one thing to suspect a source of microplastic pollution, but quite another to see it happening,” Ruf said. “The microplastics data that has been available in the past has been so sparse, just brief snapshots that aren’t repeatable.”
Next up, the researchers are testing hypotheses from their findings and conducting experiments in a wave-generating tank to learn the relationship between surface roughness and the presence of microplastics. Small wins that they hope add up to big gains in fighting a gigantic environmental problem.

Seabird eggs contaminated with plastic additives – study

Herring gull eggs have been found to be contaminated with chemical additives used in plastic production, researchers said.A study looked for evidence of phthalates – a group of chemicals added to plastics to keep them flexible – in newly laid herring gull eggs.The research by the universities of Exeter and Queensland found up to six types of phthalate per egg.The chemicals function as pro-oxidants – potentially causing oxidative stress that can damage cells.Unfortunately, our findings suggest that mothers are inadvertently passing on phthalates and products of lipid damageREAD MOREProfessor Jon Blount, of the Centre for Ecology and Conservation at the University of Exeter’s Penryn Campus in Cornwall said: “Herring gull mothers pass on vital nutrients to their offspring via their eggs.“This includes lipids that nourish developing embryos, and vitamin E, which helps to protect chicks from oxidative stress that can occur during development and at hatching.“Unfortunately, our findings suggest that mothers are inadvertently passing on phthalates and products of lipid damage – and eggs with higher phthalate contamination also contained greater amounts of lipid damage and less vitamin E.”The researchers say the impact of their findings on developing chicks is not yet known, and further research is needed.They collected 13 herring gulls eggs from sites in Cornwall and all 13 were found to contain phthalates.Phthalates – which are used in most plastic products and readily leech out – can build up in living organisms by becoming concentrated in fatty tissues.While the study does not show where the gulls acquired the phthalates, they have been previously found in species preyed on by herring gulls, and the birds are known to swallow plastic.More research is now needed to discover how developing offspring are affected by being exposed to phthalates before they have even emerged as a hatchlingProf Blount said: “Research on the impact of plastic on animals has largely focused on entanglement and ingestion of plastic fragments.“Far less is known about the impacts of plastic additives on the body.“By testing eggs, our study gives us a snapshot of the mother’s health – and it appears phthalate contamination could be associated with increased oxidative stress, and mothers transfer this cost to their offspring via the egg.“More research is now needed to discover how developing offspring are affected by being exposed to phthalates before they have even emerged as a hatchling.”The study received an initiator grant from QUEX, and is published in the journal Marine Pollution Bulletin.