Through the Gyre

Through the Gyre Size The borders of the plastic garbage patch are difficult to determine because much of the plastic is in pieces too small to be seen by satellites or planes. Location By now, most of us are aware that there is a large patch of floating plastic in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. What you may not know is that it's not made up of plastic bags and empty bottles. It's made up of billions of tiny pieces of plastic, and it's basically invisible unless you're floating in it. While this might sound better, it's actually much worse for the environment-and for you. The garbage patch is located in the North Pacific Gyre, one of five major swirling vortices of currents in the world's oceans. Estimates of the size range from about 250,00o square miles (an area roughly the size of Texas) to 6 million square miles, which would mean that the garbage patch covers about 10 percent of the entire Pacific Ocean. Plastic Chemicals Plastics in the water absorb floating chemicals, which are attracted to Formation Of the 200 billion pounds of plastic people use each year, about 10 percent ends up in the ocean. the plastics' oil base. Many of these chemicals are know known as persistent organic pollutants, which never leave the environment Seventy percent of that eventually sinks, but the other 30 percent is carried on the surface by ocean or break down. These chemicals include: currents. When plastic ends up in the waters of the Pacific, much of it Aldrin (insecticide), Chlordane (pesticide) Dieldrin (insecticide), is swept up into currents that lead to the Pacific Gyre. Garbage from the east coast of Asia takes roughly a year to reach it; garbage from the west coast of North America takes five years. DDT (pesticide), Dioxins (toxic chemicals that are an industrial waste product of actions like metal smelting and paper bleaching), Endrin (insecticide), Furans (toxic chemicals used as solvents), Heptachlor (insecticide), Hexachlo- robenzene (fungicide), Mirex (insecticide), Polychlorinated Biphenyls (or PCBS, coolant and Contents lubricant), Toxaphene (insecticide) Ninety percent of the trash floating in the world's oceans is plastic. In every square mile of ocean, accord- ing to some estimates, floats nearly 50,000 pieces of plastic. In the Pacific Gyre, most of that plastic Photodegradation The sun breaks down plastic into smaller and smaller pieces, but can never break it down entirely. Unlike organic materials, which eventu- ally biodegrade, the plastic breaks into ever smaller pieces while still remaining a polymer. Impact Ocean life can mistake the small pieces of floating plastic for zooplankton. When they eat it, they also ingest the chemicals that the plastic has absorbed. These organ- isms and small fish are consumed by larger fish, which also absorb the chemicals, and which are then comes from four sources: Low-density polyethylene (plastic bags) As it breaks apart, the plastic ultimately becomes small enough to beingested by aquaticorganisms which reside near the ocean's surface. Plastic waste enters the Polypropylene (bottle caps) Plastic Pieces eaten by people. Many of these poisonous plastics also end up in the stomachs of marine birds and Polyethylene terephthalate 39% larger than 1 millimeter (plastic water bottles) 35% 1 millimeter wide 17% 0.5 millimeters wide Expanded styrene (Styrofoam) food chain. 10% 0.3 millimeters wide animals.