UPDATE (August 28, 2009): University of California scientists studying the Pacific Ocean Garbage Patch found much more waste in the North Pacific Gyre than they expected while on their fact-finding mission. The team noted their findings “show the consequence of humanity’s footprint on nature.” (For more info, see: Pacific Ocean Garbage Patch Worries Researchers)
Managing waste is a global issue that sometimes presents a problem of collective action – it is challenging to coordinate multiple parties to solve a shared problem. Donovan Hahn’s article in The New York Times Magazine explores a topic of trash many of us never think about because of how physically removed it is from most of our daily lives. Along Alaska’s outer coast, marine debris is strewn about—much of it crossing the Gulf of Alaska or even the Pacific Ocean. This “Sea of Trash” is created “when people throw it from ships or leave it in the path of an incoming tide, but also when rivers carry it there, or when sewage systems and storm drains overflow.” Places from Alaska to Hawaii suffer from the adverse effects of waste washing up on beaches and fouling the environment but it is difficult to track the sources of the waste material and effectively police the problem.
From cleanup projects focused on the Garbage Patch in the Pacific to Gore Point in Alaska, scientists, environmental groups (such as Go-AK), and federal and local governments are looking for advanced solutions to tackle safe and effective cleanup and disposal. This article brings up some interesting points about waste resolution issues, especially concerning where waste originates.
Is the problem a lack of education? Do we need more stringent policies? What is the best and most workable solution?
A lot of this plastic material comes from lost fishing nets, cargo containers of plastic goods falling off ships, etc. It is hard to see how education could eliminate these problems; it would take legislation, perhaps treaties.
Converting the plastic to syngas is an interesting idea. The question on my mind is if there is a high enough density of material to power the machinery to harvest it, let alone produce a product to make it pay. I can contemplate a factory ship which “eats” floating plastic, turns it to syngas, burns part of it to run itself and converts the rest to something like methanol, but the concept and the execution are two very different things.
I think there is a disconnect between tossing a piece of garbage, and the final resting place of the garbage.
I grew up living on a sailboat, and one of the most alarming sights I have ever seen was a floating raft of trash, over a mile long, created by a current vortex. The sight, and smell, of a plastic ocean was chilling.
I think it is important to recognize and address this as a global challenge, as the majority of the oceans are international waters.