Focus on Trash Island, Save Our Life
ENG 101----proposal paper
Rebecca Yuan
Nov 28, 2012
Focus on Trash Island, Save Our Life Ignored by humans for decades of years, garbage floating on the ocean has become a trash island. The island consists of plastic bags, cans, tires and other plastic debris. The worse thing is that the trash island is still growing. The seawater in the center of Subtropical Airflow of pacific flows extremely slowly, with the addition of weather patterns, a large amount of garbage gather in this place. Year after year, a trash island has formed, which was called “the eighth continent”. It consists of four million tons of pelagic plastics, chemical sludge, and other debris, researchers estimate island area may be twice the size of Texas! (Wikipedia.com) The floating debris can absorb organic pollutants from seawater, and then such debris can be ingested by small fish, which are then eaten by larger fish. Many of these fish are then consumed by humans, resulting in their ingestion of toxic chemicals. (Ballard 2004). Therefore, human life will be threatened by this situation. What should be done to reduce the amount of pollution and garbage building up on trash islands? It is undeniable we should take this problem seriously; otherwise humans will be faced with disaster. After realized how urgent we should clean the trash island, humans did a lot of work, try to diminish it. Once it was a project called “Project Kaisei”, which devoted to study the ways of cleaning up the trash island. According to the material, in 2009, Project Kaisei embarked on its first expedition to the Pacific Patch. There are two vessels in this trip, one is the “Kaisei”, and the other is the “New Horizon”. Each research vessel had a crew of scientists and volunteers on board in order to research the effects that might be occurring as a result of the large amounts of floating debris in this area of ocean. Investigation was carried out for material science, toxicity, invasive species, ecosystem
Rebecca Yuan
Nov 28, 2012
Focus on Trash Island, Save Our Life Ignored by humans for decades of years, garbage floating on the ocean has become a trash island. The island consists of plastic bags, cans, tires and other plastic debris. The worse thing is that the trash island is still growing. The seawater in the center of Subtropical Airflow of pacific flows extremely slowly, with the addition of weather patterns, a large amount of garbage gather in this place. Year after year, a trash island has formed, which was called “the eighth continent”. It consists of four million tons of pelagic plastics, chemical sludge, and other debris, researchers estimate island area may be twice the size of Texas! (Wikipedia.com) The floating debris can absorb organic pollutants from seawater, and then such debris can be ingested by small fish, which are then eaten by larger fish. Many of these fish are then consumed by humans, resulting in their ingestion of toxic chemicals. (Ballard 2004). Therefore, human life will be threatened by this situation. What should be done to reduce the amount of pollution and garbage building up on trash islands? It is undeniable we should take this problem seriously; otherwise humans will be faced with disaster. After realized how urgent we should clean the trash island, humans did a lot of work, try to diminish it. Once it was a project called “Project Kaisei”, which devoted to study the ways of cleaning up the trash island. According to the material, in 2009, Project Kaisei embarked on its first expedition to the Pacific Patch. There are two vessels in this trip, one is the “Kaisei”, and the other is the “New Horizon”. Each research vessel had a crew of scientists and volunteers on board in order to research the effects that might be occurring as a result of the large amounts of floating debris in this area of ocean. Investigation was carried out for material science, toxicity, invasive species, ecosystem
Cited: "Project Kaisei - Capturing the Plastic Vortex." Project Kaisei - Capturing the Plastic Vortex. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Dec. 2012. Ballard, K. ―The importance and conservation of Biomes.‖ University of California. (2004) "Great Pacific Garbage Patch. “Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pacific_Garbage_Patch>. Captain Charles Moore. Earth Island Journal, Aug. 2009. Web. 05 Dec. 2012. Silverman,J.(2007,September 19).Why is the World 's Biggest Land fill in the Pacific Ocean Retrieved February13,2012,from HowStuffWorks: http://science.howstuffworks.com/environmental/earth/oceanography/greatYpacificYgarbageYpatch3.html Grant, R.(2009,April 24).Drowning in plastic: The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is twice the size of France.The 'Telegraph . Interagency Report on Marine Debris Sources, Impacts, Strategies and Recommendations. Interagency marine debris coordinating committee (2008) McLendon,R.(2010,February 24).What 'is 'the 'Great 'Pacific 'Garbage 'Patch? Retrieved February 13, 2012,from Mother Nature Network: http://www.mnn.com/earthYmatters/translatingYuncleYsam/stories/whatYisYtheYgreatYpacificYoceanYgarbageYpatch