8. 6 x more plastic than plankton 1999 Plastic to plankton ratio = 6:1 2008 Plastic to plankton ratio = 46:1 AMRF
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11. What do you see in the stomach of this albatross chick?
12. “ Litter does not distinguish itself between biodegradable or non-biodegradable.” American Chemistry Council letter to the City of Monterey, 2/6/2008 Gregg Segal
14. Turtles often mistake plastic bags for jellyfish. What does this look like? A jellyfish Many species suffer from ingestion and entanglement of plastics bags.
17. Plastics absorb POPs, such as PCB’s and DDT. PCB DDT Mato, Y et al, Environmental Science & Technology Plastics and Styrofoam are toxics sponges. Japanese study found up to 1 million times more pollutants on plastics pieces than in ambient seawater.
18. Plastics leach the chemicals they are made of. 1) Bisphenol A - plastics hardener - DVD’s, canned food lining, older Nalgene bottles Found in the urine of 93% of the U.S. population. Links to breast cancer, obesity, mood disorders, etc. Hunt, Patricia August 1998, Current Biology 2) Phthalates - a class of plastics softeners - nail polish, children’s toys, teething rings, bath books, moisturizers, cosmetics Easily release into environment as the plastic ages and breaks down over time. Endocrine disruptors / hormone mimickers
19. The New Double Standard Toys are manufactured with phthalates for the American market Toys are manufactured without phthalates for the European Union & other markets following their REACH Act lead (Mexico, Argentina, Japan, Canada etc) EU banned phthalates in children’s toys in 1999 and cosmetics in 2004 Mark Schapiro- Exposed: The Toxic Chemistry of Everyday Products, and What's at Stake for American Power
20. Ad from the American Chemistry Council 2008 - SB 1713 - ban BPA from baby bottles, sippy cups and other baby food & beverage containers.
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25. “ Now packaged with less plastic.” SanDisc Memory Card at Costco
The Surfrider Foundation is a non-profit environmental organization dedicated to the protection and enjoyment of the world's oceans, waves and beaches for all people, through CARE: conservation, activism, research and education. Founded in 1984 by a handful of visionary surfers in Malibu, California, the Surfrider Foundation now maintains over 50,000 members and 90 chapters worldwide. The SF has launched the RAP “Rise Above Plastics” campaign to reduce the impact of plastics in the marine environment by raising awareness of plastic pollution and advocating for the reduction of single use disposable plastics The NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) California Bay Watershed Education and Training (B-WET) Program provides funds to support environment-based education throughout the watersheds of San Francisco Bay, Monterey Bay, and Santa Barbara Channel. Recognizing that an educated community is the key to understanding and sustaining the nation's ocean and coastal environments, funded projects provide meaningful watershed educational experiences to students, teachers, and communities.
Agenda
- WW II shortages accelerated the production of synthetic replacements for rope, rubber, metal and paper. - The thesis of the Life article: a housewife would be more efficient if she didn’t have to spend time washing and putting away the dishes. - Disposables became firmly embedded into 1st world consciousness - before, saved everything. - Seemed like a great idea at the time, BUT, the problem is that every knife, fork, spoon, plate, tray, cup you see in this picture continues to exist, and will continue to exist for hundreds and possibly thousands of years. EVERY PIECE OF PLASTIC EVER MANUFACTURED CONTINUES TO EXIST. (except for small amount that’s been incinerated which is VERY bad for ghg so don’t want to do that). That’s the problem with material that is not biodegradable. No micro-organism can break it down- even if 1 micron thick - still a piece of plastic. - Plastics: a ‘miracle product’ - light, strong, durable, malleable, soft, hard, any color you want, any size you want, any shape you want, lasts forever. Should be using it smartly, for durable products, not for single-use throw away products and packaging. We are learning that there is a colossal price to pay for this.
What IS plastic?… petroleum &/or natural gas, chemicals, dyes Extract petroleum and natural gas (fossil fuel, unsustainable) Ship it to a refinery where it gets processed, boiled, separated for different uses (extremely energy intensive) Ship it to factory where add many chemicals and plasticizers Ship it to next factory where pppp made - all plastic things start off as pre-production plastic pellets, look like fish eggs, found around world Ship it to next factory to make product, in this case film Ship it to distributors then to stores where you get final products Showing here the examples that we are focusing on as needing to drastically reduce, or redesign: water bottles; plastic bags; Styrofoam; baby teethers; packaging -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Nurdles nicknamed by Huntington Beach high schoolers picking up 1,000’s of them in beach cleanups b/c many plastics manufacturing facilities in L.A. have been careless with the. Major points: 1- look at amount of energy and resources that go into these items we use for minutes and then dispose of – it’s crazy 2- look what goes into your baby’s mouth
- Ballona Creek is a tributary of the L.A. River. This is what happens when there are rainstorms. All trash on streets, sidewalks, parking lots, parks etc go down storm drains and underground pipes, down rivers and creeks – and flow to beaches and ocean. For all practical purposes, THE OCEAN IS DOWNHILL FROM EVERYWHERE. Note that majority is single use disposables – Styrofoam cups and water bottles. 100 billion bags; worldwide annual plastic bag estimate is anywhere from 500 billion – 1 trillion = DEVASTATING the oceans, and land, with these only one real solution to this burgeoning issue– one tiny, individual action by 100 million people, just say No! No thanks, I brought my own bag. - 1 out of every 3 servings of water consumed in the U.S. now comes in a container… - 45 million water bottles a day are consumed in U.S. alone. Some reasons for why this is so foolish and insane: Most bottled water IS tap water, often filtered. Dasani = Coke; Aquafina = Pepsi; =Nestle (Fiji water actually from Fiji, consider shipping costs, consider their water supply) Taking local water supplies of many towns. -Tap water is EPA regulated and tested, bottled is FDA regulated - much looser standards It takes about 5 times more water to actually make the bottle than it actually holds Bottled water= $0.89/gallon- $8.26/gallon; filtered water=$.13/gallon; tap water=$.002/gallon; we pay from 240-10,000 times more per unit bottle of bottled vs tap. A marketing scheme that’s exploded in the last 5-10 years. Typically 90 percent or more of the cost paid by bottled water consumers goes to things other than the water itself—bottling, packaging, shipping, marketing, retailing, other expenses, and profit. Our cities/municipalities/states/country has spent A LOT of $ creating infrastructure to deliver safe drinking water to our homes, we’re wasting it and giving them little incentive to continue investing in the infrastructure. - Each bottle should be 1/3 filled with oil, that’s how much oil this in the plastic manufacturing & transportation costs Bottle is recycleable, caps are not, we’ll see later what happens to those caps THERE IS NO LOGICAL EXPLANATION FOR REGULAR BOTTLED WATER USE: IT COSTS MORE, OFFERS LESS, AND POLLUTES OUR PLANET UNFORGIVINGLY Note: 50 bottles = 1 fleece jacket, recycling DOES work when it happens, so DO recycle (though most fleece made from virgin plastic, look for recycled plastic fleece) www.foodandwaterwatch.org/water
All the white bits in this photo are Styrofoam - this is why we have been pushing for Styrofoam ordinances for food vendor to-go containers. It breaks apart into tiny pieces and mimics fish food. It is also a real nuisance to pick up. Our beach cleanup volunteers always come back saying “ban the stuff!”
So, with all of our waste going to the ocean we have created a phenomenon that’s come to be known as The Great Pacific Garbage Patch. This graphic illustrates the GPGP (technically 2 major patches, Eastern and Western patches) With certain weather patterns (high and low pressure systems) and the earths rotation there are huge, circulating currents that go around the oceans. These act like sweeping movements that scour the shores and bring everything/debris in to the middle, where (in the Pacific esp) it is very calm- like the eye of a hurricane. So any floating garbage, usually plastic, that floats off the beach ends up riding the current, for months and years, to eventually be spit out into the center, where it exists for 100s/1000s of years. All trash on streets, sidewalks, parking lots, parks etc go down storm drains and underground pipes, down rivers and creeks – and flow to beaches and ocean. For all practical purposes, THE OCEAN IS DOWNHILL FROM EVERYWHERE. We should dispel the myth that it’s a floating garbage island, it’s not. It’s more like a big plastic soup. Plastic bits float on the surface and also, depending on densities, float within the water column several meters down. Eastern patch about two times the size of Texas - an approximation - but likely the biggest in the world’s oceans. This makes sense because on one side is China - world’s biggest producers of stuff, on the other side is the U.S.- world’s biggest consumers of stuff. 90% plastic makes sense b/c most plastic floats; and nearly all consumer goods and single-use disposables are plastic 80% land based means 20% is ship based- accidental or intentional dumping from cargo, cruise, navy ships; otherwise comes from shores.
Captain Charlie Moore of the Algalita Marine Research Foundation (he ‘discovered’ the GPGP and has spent a decade trying to get people to pay attention) sailed out to the gyre, trawled with a fine mesh net for a mile and that’s what he found, in picture. The problem – zooplankton is the bottom of the food chain, it is getting replaced by plastic. According to Moore the area which seems to have THE MOST (46:1 ratio) is not in either of the Western or Eastern garbage patches, it’s in the current or ‘highway’ between them that is slowly connecting them. Quote from an email Moore wrote last year: “ We sampled the same stations that were done in 1999, even sampling at the same time of day. You will note the following changes: plastic weight, up 158%, plastic count, up 225%, and the kicker, plastic:plankton ratio up 893% -- that is, we found a plastic to zooplankton ratio by weight of 46 to 1.”
- Moore then puts the trawl contents into a Petri dish and meticulously counts and weighs every little bit (that’s the ratio count). - Plastic does not biodegrade but it does photodegrade – the sun makes the plastic brittle and it breaks up into smaller and smaller pieces. But even if 1 micron thick, it is still a piece of plastic (very strong synthetic polymers) that remains floating around for 100s/1000s ? of years (no one knows really, but a very very very long time, well past the usefulness of the product). Since it’s synthetic (man made), microorganisms have not evolved with plastic and can not deal with it (i.e. digest it). So it is a diffuse “soup,” virtually impossible to clean up. It has become part of the ocean ecosystem.
Honing in on NW Hawaiian Island now because they are in the middle of the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre. Adult Laysan Albatross and three chicks (WWII relics on island). The poster child for marine debris has become the albatross because so many are dying of plastics ingestion. They live far, far out in the middle of the ocean and eat by skimming off of the ocean’s surface, where plastic pieces float. Albatross are the world’s largest seabird, with an 8-12 ft wingspan, and a lifespan of 40 years. - Bird information, important to talk about now so people understand how chicks are fed: At about 8-10 yrs old they look for a mate, monogamous for life. Female has one chick per year. Once born the parents take turns going out to sea and foraging for food, for a couple of weeks at a time, while other stays with chick. When out to sea the parent skims surface of ocean looking for shrimp and squid and krill, picks at top of water eating the food, returns and regurgitates the food into chick’s mouth.
In this slide- upper left hand corner are eye and beak; lower left corner and top middle are wings; the rest is the stomach contents. This albatross chick was fed what its parents picked up out of the ocean, mistaking all of these plastic pieces for food (remember the plastic:plankton ratio). You see many bottle caps, toy wheel, comb. Many reds and oranges and pinks – birds mistake them for shrimp. Albatross die of starvation (stomach full of plastics that don’t digest so can’t eat any food); dehydration; lesions & infections from pieces injuring stomach lining. Of the 500,000 albatross chicks born per year in the NW Hawaiian Islands, approx 200,000+ (40%) are dying of plastics ingestion. But 100% have been found to have plastics in their bellies. This is the case with sea birds all over the world. Northern Fulmar in the North Sea – in the late 90’s Dutch researchers found 98% of Fulmars had plastics in their bellies, average number of pieces in the bellies: 31. www.algalita.org www.chrisjordan.com/gallery/midway
The bones, feathers, beak of this bird will decompose and become part of the island- that’s the cycle of life. But what do you think will happen to those bottle caps and plastic pieces? NOT decompose, the wind will likely carry the garbage back out to sea, to ultimately have the same sad impact over and over again- THAT’S what it means to be non-biodegradable. The incidence of plastic ingestion in many long-lived species is an emerging ecological issue on a global scale. In 2008 the City of Monterey voted to ban food vendor Styrofoam to-go containers. The opposition came from the ACC - American Chemistry Council, an EXTREMELY deep-pocketed trade group, members include Dupont, Dow Chemical, ExxonMobil, Honeywell, 3M, Shell… They hired a local PR firm to galvanize opposition. It didn’t work. They inundated the City Staff with letters, industry funded studies, dozens of questions requiring detailed answers. We took this quote from one of the ACC (American Chemistry Council) letters, because it displays the absurdity of some of the arguments they try and make.
Note green hook in chicks mouth. The chick had grown up with the hook fixed there, the beak had become slightly deformed. It’s a plastic hook of some kind. The chick can’t get it out, parent bird can’t get it out, they have no hands or fingers to pry item out. The researchers manage to finally to pry it out - it is a plastic hook of a mesh produce bag, something that might have held a few avocadoes or lemons in a distant shop. It’s a mundane/every day item that most of us never give a thought to anymore, but as we can see, it turns out that it’s not a mundane item to these animals. This is why being careful with our trash and picking up litter is important - there is tons and tons of garbage out there, but every piece counts. WE LIVE IN A THROWAWAY SOCIETY BUT THERE IS NO MORE ‘AWAY’ IN ‘THROWAWAY.’ ‘Away’ has a destination…. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7314240.stm
Plastic bags blow. Unfortunately these photos are not hard to find on the Web, there are a lot, b/c it is what’s happening out there. Issues are ingestion and entanglement. These animals have no arms or hands or any means of disentangling themselves or pulling bags out of their mouths.
Top photo is is a snapping turtle that walked through a milk jug ring as a juvenile (the ring left behind on the opening once the cap pulled off). The ring got stuck, the turtle grew. Question: WHY SHOULD A SIX-PACK HOLDER OR A WATER BOTTLE BE MADE TO LAST 500 YEARS? WHY SHOULD A STYROFOAM COFFEE CUP OR YOGURT CUP BE MADE TO LAST 500 YEARS? Why should something that we use for 5 minutes be made to last for 500 years/for your great-great-great-great-great grandchildren to see/deal with? Consider the MATERIAL DISSONANCE – it really really doesn’t make sense, but we’ve gotten so used to this stuff that we don’t think about it. How would we feel if we were still finding trash from the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria? - “Cristopher Columbus- the 1492 Voyage!” That is the legacy we are leaving for future generations. More people need to see these photos so they can ask themselves whether the short term convenience of a plastic bag is worth the long term harm we are doing. (Happy ending, her name is Mae West, she is alive and lives in Louisiana zookeepers home.)
From preservatives in lipstick to flame retardants in our sofas, from plasticizers in our water bottles to pesticides on our fruits and vegetables. Average American has a body burden of about 100 chemicals, we are a cocktail of exposures. Approx 100,000 synthetic chemicals have been introduced in last 50 yrs - averages about 2,000 chemicals a year put out by industry, government can’t possibly test them all. According to the EPA, 95% of chemicals have never undergone even minimal testing for their toxicity or environmental impact. UC Berkeley School of Public Health estimates 42 billion pounds of chemicals enter American commerce daily . Will talk about 2 phenomena – leaching and absorbing of chemicals. Most people have heard by now that chemicals leach out of the plastic and into our food and drink and into the environment, but plastics also absorb chemicals. www.ourstolenfuture.org “ Exposed” by Mark Schapiro
PLASTICS ABSORB POPs- Persistent Organic Pollutants. E.g. petro-chemicals such as PCBs and DDT (PCBs, used as coolants for transformers, DDT, pesticide). Virtually all pesticides are petroleum based, so they don’t dissolve in water, they just float around (are hydrophobic -’sc ared of water’) but they are lipid soluble (easily absorbed into fat). Pesticides are sprayed on crops, but with drift and runoff much ends up floating around in the ocean. When a pesticide (or other petrochemical) molecule runs into a plastic piece, a fellow petroleum product, it latches on. Plastic pieces have been found to absorb up to 1 MILLION TIMES the amount of toxic chemicals than that are present in ambient seawater. Tiny critter eats a plastic piece with chemicals attached, then a bigger animal eats that etc up the food chain. Each time it gets into the fat cells of the next animal it bio-magnifies in concentration because it never gets excreted (urinated or sweated etc out bc not water soluble). Charlie Moore calls the plastic particles "poison pills" because they absorb and concentrate toxic chemicals, acting like sponges for DDT, PCBs and other oily pollutants. "It's a serious situation," he says, "when you've got a material that comes in all shapes and sizes, can mimic every type of food in the sea, and is capable of absorbing persistent pollutants that are endocrine disruptors.” Note- PCBs have long been classified as a probable human carcinogen. They cause endocrine system disruption by mimicking hormones, notably estrogen, and have been linked to a number of developmental effects including low birth weight, decreased IQ, and subnormal performance on standardized tests. PCBs may also cause liver, reproductive system, and thyroid damage. This is a looming public health disaster.
Will discuss two kinds - plastics hardeners and plastics softeners. 1. Bisphenol A (BPA) - A bit of history, in August 1998, geneticist Patricia Hunt noticed a bizarre change in the eggs of the female mice she was studying. For some inexplicable reason, the chromosomes in 40% of the eggs looked abnormal- a wild jump from the 1%-2% abnormality her lab typically observes. She replicated the study- same results. Then she noticed that her mouse cages, made of polycarbonate (Nalgene bottle type of plastic), appeared odd. Her lab worker had mistakenly washed the cages with bleach. They eventually linked the meiotic abnormalities to BPA, leached from the damaged plastic. So, some plastic is not inert - it’s chemicals leach out. Bleach and heat catalyze the release of the chemicals into food, drink etc. Use alcohol for cleaning grease and oils from polycarbonate. Also, should not microwave Tupperware. SFO banned sale of baby bottles with BPA in 2006, but the ban was never enforced, and in May 2007 the city repealed the ban L. But now many companies, like Nalgene, are now going “BPA-free” because of all bad publicity it has received lately. 2. Phthalates (pronounced tha’lates) refer to a whole class of plasticizers. Some are non-toxic, while others are problematic because they are endocrine disruptors. Endocrine disruptors are chemicals that mimic natural hormones- fooling the body into mis-responding when a chemical enters. Netherlands study: adult men asked to chew on pieces of plastic children’s toys then tested their saliva and blood, phthalate level spiked, concluding how easily phthalates pass into the human body. Denmark study: high level of phthalates = low testosterone levels in male infants. Harvard School of Public Health, 2003, correlation b/w phthalate levels and sperm motility and concentration. CDC’s ongoing assessment found phthalates in every single test subject, highest in women and children. ‘ Exposed’ by Mark Schapiro
World Wildlife Fund took blood samples from EU members of Parliament in 2004- detected phthalates in all 39 Ministers, who unanimously subsequently voted to ban several phthalates (those which studies prove to be most harmful). American companies that have been forced to meet higher standards in Europe claim that they can not do the same thing in the U.S. In industry after industry a new double standard is emerging- the protection being offered Europeans vs Americans. The EU and US use the exact same scientific evidence but come to different conclusions. The EU is using the Precautionary Principle - saying there is enough evidence to show there COULD be a problem, so let’s get rid of the chemicals before its too late. The US does not use the Precautionary Principle (basically because so heavily lobbied by industry) and says the evidence only shows that there COULD be a problem, but does not PROVE that there is a problem. This implies that a law will take effect only when disaster strikes. But, if there are chemicals that science is pointing towards their causing long-lasting, slowly leaching, irreversible damage in the future, why wait? By the time it’s definitively proven, it could be much too late to do something about it. REACH Act 2006 in Europe is the Registration, Evaluation and Authorization of Chemicals - comprehensive review for potential harmful health and environmental effects at ALL chemicals of 1 ton or more produced or imported to EU. vs TSC Act of 1976 in US. Toxic Substances Control Act - which grandfathered in all existing chemicals, is weak, and has many exceptions. Wikipedia.
Senate Bill 1713 was to ban BPA from baby bottles and other baby-related food containers. This was the horribly misinforming ad put out by the ACC. (because BPA is in canned food lining, implication of ad is we’ll have no food left, though the bill had nothing to do with canned foods). SB1713 did not pass.
If time, have people call out their ideas. “ Engage yourself in everyday choices…” bring out facial foam scrub and show ‘phthalate’ ask yr supermarket to stock xyz product “ Go to your local council meeting….” enough people speak out = action; believe in the power of the people - they get elected in, they get elected out. True for local, county, state, fed… help put the "plague of plastics" into daily public discourse “ Do a plastics audit in yr home or business…” liquid soap convenient, true, but prob is 100s of millions of people buying them. If LOVE yr liquid soap, then see where else you can cut back on plastic. Next page for rest of points…
“ If your hands are free…”… ‘ Adopt a quarter block’ that is, the 1 block area in front of your house. Adopt it. Take care of that turf. Neighbors will see and follow good lead. an overwhelming amount of trash out there, but each piece you pick up is important, because it WON’T end up in stomach of an animal A man was walking down the beach that was covered in starfish that had washed up from a storm the night before. He saw a little boy picking up starfish and throwing them back in the water. The man said to him “What are you doing? There are way too many starfish. You can’t possibly pick them all up. It won’t make a difference.” The little boy picked another and threw it in the water and responded “It makes a difference to that starfish.” “ Demand EPR legislation” Ask if anyone knows what this is… (answer on next slide) 3 pronged solution: Consumer choices - buying more consciously Government action - local ordinances; state and fed bills re: waste reduction Business responsibility - designing smarter packaging, implementing more take-back programs
In Germany government legislation pushed industry to re-design packaging and create take-back programs. Called the ‘Green dot program’ (participating businesses put green dots on the packaging). Result, an astounding quantity of plastics moved to recycling stream. We must demand EPR legislation here. See - California Product Stewardship Council
And, it’s becoming popular to reduce waste. It’s also economical! (duh) This is a good time to be pushing our government to take the lead on this…
Recycling has not been a viable solution. Less recovery/reycling than people think. Average about 6%. The numbers 1-7 recycling symbols very deceptive. Diff. municipalities take different numbers: Some only 1s and 2s, Some through 5, Virtually all toss out 6 and 7.
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