Talk:Three Wishes (food)
Why We Should Care About Plastic Pollution
Have you ever heard of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch? It’s a giant floating mass of plastic waste brought together by various ocean currents between Hawaii and California. It’s twice the size of the state of Texas! Ocean garbage patches are one of the most visible indicators of just how much plastic is in our ocean today.
While plastics have been in use for many decades, it’s an extremely current issue - half of all plastics ever manufactured have been made in the last 15 years. In fact, plastic pollution is one of the most urgent environmental issues. It contributes to the rapid acceleration of global warming, causing floods, forest fires, and other calamities to become more severe and more frequent. Plus, it’s having a direct and negative impact on marine (and land) life.
Let’s dig into where plastic comes from, how it impacts marine life, and more importantly - what we can do about it.
WHERE DOES PLASTIC COME FROM?<a href="https://seasmartschool.com/blog/why-we-should-care-about-plastic-pollution">WHERE DOES PLASTIC COME FROM?</a> Plastics are made from fossil fuels and were created approximately a century ago. It was an amazing invention that transformed every aspect of our lives. It has revolutionized the healthcare industry with life-saving devices, decreased the weight of cars and jets (which in turn reduces fuel usage), and made other innovations possible, such as helmets, incubators, and filters.
While plastics have created many modern conveniences, they have unfortunately led to a tremendous amount of waste around the globe. Single-use plastics account for 40 percent of the plastic produced every year. Most of these products, such as plastic bags and food wrappers, have a very short lifespan of a few minutes or hours. When they are eventually disposed of, they affect the environment for centuries.
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN PLASTIC IS IN THE OCEAN? Once plastic is in the ocean, sunlight, wind, and waves break down plastic waste into small particles, often less than one-fifth of an inch across. These “microplastics” are spread throughout the ocean and have been discovered everywhere in the world.
Microplastics further break down into smaller and smaller pieces and are everywhere in our environment. Plastic microfibers, for example, have been found in municipal drinking water systems and drifting through the air.
