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THE WAR ON PLASTIC
PLASTIC WASTE – ANOTHER HUMAN IGNORANCE DILEMMA. PHOTO:ZAK NOYLE MORE
"The best day to start a war against plastic was 20 years ago, the second best day is today".
So, starting today we are joining in on the war and will use our 2000 Nautical Miles to do what we can. Happily we can see an increasing number of initiatives against the use of plastics on both global and local levels. Several cool projects are shedding light on the issue and we hope that we can inspire others in the same way as they have inspired us. Here some of them:
HERE IS HOW:
We want to see what the status is in our own waters. So, guided by our project's "Science Advisor", Professor Martin Hassellöv at the Department of Marine Science at the University of Gothenburg, we will trawl for micro plastics in the waters we are sailing through. Our results will be filmed and posted online as we go along. We are also preparing for the opportunity to create a "citizen science project" where we can send samples to laboratories for scientific analysis.
SOME FACTS ON PLASTIC:
You have probably heard the statement that if we don't halt the use of plastic now, there will be more plastic than fish in the oceans by the year of 2050. Let's keep it a 2018 statement and never allow it to become a fact.
Got 7-8 minutes? Check the video when Dr. Jennifer Lavers digs out a belly full of plastic on a shearwater bird on Lord Howe Island...
The worst part with the plastic already out there is that it will never go away, it will only get smaller... meaning that a plastic bottle will degrade into pieces, then into smaller pieces, then into micro-plastics and eventually into nano-plastics. Other sources are the very tiny pieces of polyethylene plastic from health and beauty products, such as peeling products and toothpastes or the wear and tear from car tires.
All these tiny particles floats through our water filtration systems every day and end up in our rivers, lakes and oceans. This means that the world's entire food chain is already having plastic for lunch and dinner. Planktons already eat it, fish and turtles eat plankton, birds eat fish. Whales, bears and humans do as well.
MICRO PLASTIC SWALLOWED BY PLANKTON. (Plymouth Marine Lab).
TURTLES EAT FISH AND PLANKTON. THIS ONE ALSO, AS A TURTLE KID, GOT STUCK IN A PLASTIC RING FROM ONE OF OUR BOTTLES... (TED Talk)
12 BILLION TONS OF PLASTIC WASTE
Plastics have outgrown most man-made materials and have long been under environmental scrutiny. In July 2017 a report presented the first global analysis of all mass-produced plastics ever manufactured. They estimated that 8300 million metric tons of new "virgin" plastics have been produced to that date.
While doing so we have generated some 6300 Mt of plastic waste ...around 9% of which has been recycled, 12% bas been burned, and 79% is accumulated in landfills, oceans or in "the natural environment". If current production and waste management trends continue, roughly 12,000 Mt of plastic waste will be pored into landfills and oceans by 2050. Source
CHECK FOR YOURSELF AND START TODAY
Yes, it is more or less impossible to avoid plastic. But... it is possible to be more aware of it and to decrease the daily use of plastic on a personal, individual, family, corporate and community level. Starting today.
Go and buy groceries in any store, take out all food from packages and containers, pile up the plastic and take a good look: There you go – your contribution to the billion tons of plastic waste.
Take a picture of your pile and post it on your Insta, Facebook, Snap or Twitter and promise your followers and yourself that its time to be the change and take steps towards a plastic free life.
YES, THERE IS STILL HOPE – THE ECO SYSTEM CAN RECOVER
Fortunately, most ecosystems have the ability to recover – and for that to happen we have to halt the environmental degradation. Many different measures need to be implemented and the efforts have to start now. We – society and individuals – also need to combine our forces and work together. And for us up here, according to scientists there is still time to save the Baltic Sea.