Why 99% of ocean plastic pollution is "missing"
The plastic we dump into the ocean might be hiding in plain sight.
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For the past several years scientists have been trying to account for the 8 million metric tonnes of plastic that we dump into the ocean each year. The assumption was that a large portion of it was floating out in one of the large garbage patches, where swirling debris accumulates thanks to ocean gyres. But recent measurements of the amount of trash in the patches fell far short of what’s thought to be out there.
Scientists are getting closer to an answer, which could help clean-up efforts and prevent further damage to marine life and ocean ecosystems.
In a previous version of this video, we mistakenly compared the size of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch to the area of Australia. It is in fact roughly 1.6 million square kilometers, a little more than twice the size of the state of Texas. A huge area, but not nearly as big as Australia. Source: www.nature.com/articles/s4159...
For anyone interested in participating in the Ocean Conservancy's annual beach clean-up events, here is the link with information:
oceanconservancy.org/trash-fr...
For more reading, check out this New Yorker article on the missing plastic problem, which inspired this video:
www.newyorker.com/news/news-d...
Laurent Lebreton’s research that estimates the amount of debris in the garbage patches is here:
www.nature.com/articles/s4159...
For more about Ocean Conservancy’s work, and their annual international beach cleanup events:
oceanconservancy.org/
For more reading about Erik Van Sebille’s work:
erik.vansebille.com/
For more reading about Melanie Bergmann’s work:
www.theverge.com/2021/1/12/22...
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It's honestly concerning how little is being done about plastic pollution.
@@emerickdeneb9621 may i know the name of the documentary?
well.. duh?
It’s sad tbh
@zouooks the name is seaspiracy
@@zerno7610 I think he's talking about seaspiracy, great documentary btw, I really recommend it
So we hadn't explored all of the oceans, but our plastics had reached everywhere. Genius 101.
yup
add cameras or trackers on random plastics and see where it goes to find where other plastic usually stays and collect them
Mashallah ! Ibra that's a good one. sad but true
Redacted by the Rice Farming Foundation
Redacted by the Rice Farming foundation.
In a twisted way, Im actually relieved most of the plastic in the ocean stays near coastlines, meaning it can be cleaned or easily found
I was thinking the same but like said in the video, it's degraded faster by sand abrasion. And I think that 1. There is more marine life in those zones, especially all the coral reefs; 2. It can't be cleaned or picked up easily at all when it's underwater, even shallow waters. A lot of it must be buried too. Sorry, not fun.
Most life lives along the coastline.
NOPE, IT IS AT BOTTOM of ALL WATERWAYS !
@@samreynolds3789 ah, an intellectual
The problem is that it partly becomes granular. When you take a sample of sand on a beach, you'll see that quite some sand grains are made of plastic.
I pick litter off my local beach almost every day. It's disheartening sometimes, because each year I see more than the last. This video encourage me to keep doing it. I live in North-west Ireland. I will always pick up face-masks, to protect the wildlife.
This is very admirable! Thank you so much for helping the environment 💕
Respect To You👍👏
Cool. Want a cookie?
@@astronova6150 yea, i think they'd appreciate a cookie
G-d bless you dude
I’m disappointed that Vox played into the narrative of putting the responsibility on individuals to pick up plastic off the beach. What about the millions of corporations producing plastic ??
what about the millions of people, mainly countries in Asia with the mindset of "oh just throw it in the water and it will just be washed away"
YOU are the person who buys the product YOU are responsible to dispose of it not the company.
@@jimlincoln1283 you have a point, but most plastic debris isn't litter, or something you throw into the ocean. Its large scale dumping by corporations
@@antonjohansson5896 No it is not from corporations. It is from third-world nations.
@@jimlincoln1283 multimillion international corporations in 3rd world countries, not consumers (even though their consumers may produce more litter than others).
Governments around the world - "Wow yeah plastic seems like an issue... somebody should probably do something"
@@thisnametooktolong meh, probably (almost) every country
The government is a scam, free the individuals and stop stealing their time and money with taxes and as individuals we will work it out.
Asia produces the waste ONLY because of the demand from rich countries.
@@thisnametooktolong nope... look at the brand... and the design ... even them can know it... its not just from asia ... haha
@Sara Crouch Now it’s sad to hear this that my country ranks as the top 5 in this list but I think that we are trying our best. One of the most smartest thing here is that about 90ish % of all the plastic bottles and metal cans (used for drinks) are recycled. Why? That is because everytime you buy a drink that is in a metal can or in a plastic bottle, depending on the size 10 - 45 cents are added to the original price of the drink. And if u return those bottles to a grocery store, you get those 10 - 45 cents back. That is the reason why so many people return the bottles which are then recycled.
An another important fact is that many people just assume that recycling is a black hole that magically makes plastic disappear. This has caused many of the items thrown into the recycling bin to not actually be recyclable. The less recyclable material, the less profitable recycling centers are, which forces them to close down and prevents new ones from opening up. It should also be noted that recycling was aggressive marketed my corporations, because it allowed to keep producing and selling plastic items while giving the appearance of being green. Remember there's a reason why recycling is the last of the 3 R's.
reading, writing, recycling?
Racketeering, Robbing, Recycling?
Repair, Reuse and Recycle. You have the point.
The fact that recycling centers need to be profitable in a capitalist world is a sign that we need to change the system. Capitalism is unsustainable in nature :/
@@marsovac yeah. Govenrment should sponsor recycling. And incentivise companies to produce less plastic or use recycled materials in first place.
Sad thing is when we pick it up and throw it away, unless it is sent to a recycling facility, it just ends up somewhere else where it doesn't belong.
Even recycling facilities just usually landfill your stuff lol
We are destroying the planet just so that a few can become billionaires. We do not recycle, that was/is just another lie from those who profit from it.
And even recycling takes energy to do. In addition most of the plastics people recycle aren't even actually recyclable so they just end up in the landfills or the ocean regardless. People NEED to stop thinking about these materials as "disposable"
Yup. And if garbage bags are used to collect it then more plastic has been added to the existing problem. I think it's still better to collect and sort it than to leave it (at least this provides the option of it being dealt with responsibly), especially if it's in a sensitive area, but it does feel like a losing battle at times. When I do go out and do some cleanup, I usually use reusable buckets to collect so I'm not adding to the problem. Seeing these cleanup operations with piles of hundreds of full garbage bags seems counter-intuitive to me... Why not just rent a couple large garbage bins and then hand out 5-gallon buckets to the volunteers?
I'm a scuba diver and I physically cannot carry enough garbage (I try anyways) that's hidden under our surface on an excursion. Local lakes, rivers, in the ocean... it's everywhere and it's so sad.
The terrible thing is, until functional process is developed for handling it, collecting it is just moving it from one place to another. My heart brakes for animals. (recycling covers so little, better than nothing but percentages are devastating)
Thank you for trying though. Before this last year I would pick up any trash I walked by. Sometimes walking through a parking lot or park just from walking to and from my car and sometimes I have hand full. Can't imagine trying in the ocean....
I stopped scuba diving due to the deep psychological damage caused by seeing plastic laying around and after seeing animals in distress or chewing plastic stuff
thank you for your efforts!
I'm a diver like yourself Zac and find it so disheartening when I see more garbage than marine life. But like yourself I pick that garbage up. Nice to know I'm not the only one.
Just like the 'Stone Age' or the 'Iron Age', in the future, our era will be referred to as the 'Plastic Age'.
I bet "technological age" will be more prominent, just simply due to the societal impact technology has had on the last few decades, and will have in the coming centuries.
Cillicone era ?
"the Petroleum Age"
pretty optimistic to think there is going to be an era after this
Nah, plastic age was a bit earlier, we live in the glass age.
The Ocean cleanup is a company that is dedicated to cleaning up trash from the ocean, they have river interceptors that clean up major factors in ocean pollution, and are working on cleaning up that ocean trash dump near CA, they're gaining ground and a sizeable amount of funding including a workforce and several ships. All their designs are fish-friendly and they're going emissions free soon. (Please correct me on any of this if it's wrong but i checked and believe this is all right)
its a scam...tax payers
@@hatespeach9835 its...not?
@@hatespeach9835 It's not even close..
@@hatespeach9835 not even close to government
The maker of it want country to buys his invention. In reality that thing doesn’t really solve the root of the problem. Which is people throwing their garbage anywhere. No matter how many times you clean the ocean or rivers with that thing it will remain polluted as long as people are not responsible in their waste management.
"Go Back to Glass," should be a slogan for returning to a glass containers/deposit system. It mirrors "Go Back to Start," game squares.
It’s not that surprising how fast we can produce plastic, but at the same time, how it takes millennia to find those which we lose.
Humans are the worst thing that has happened to this planet
@@ayushonkar850 earth done goofed lol
Its sad really
@@ayushonkar850 "HuMaNs ArE tHe WoRsT tHiNg tHaT hAs HapPeNeD tO tHiS pLaNeT" - this is idiotic. Yes we are bad for the planet itself but at the same time you only live once - if u want to actually do some good for it go and pickup litter, in the meantime i will be drunk on a beach eating ice cream. This planet is lucky to have us. We are great!
@@lessartico9163 But nature isn't lucky for because of how many ecosystems we have destroyed
Massive respect to everyone who volunteers for cleaning up shorelines!
Thanks. 😊
That's all us bi**** do, say thanks but continue to throw plastic like it is someone else's problem. Welcome to life
@@PaulTheSkeptic Hero
@@mattynek2 Oh no come on. My son had to do all this community service for his school so we found ourselves at beach cleanups quite often. I'm not a hero. Just an involved father.
@@PaulTheSkeptic thanks for making Earth 0.00000000000000000000000000000000000001% cleaner
Great study. Everyone needs to speak out against single use containers.
the whole world: we use square kilometers americans: ok so this place is twice the size of texas
I know right, everyone knows the best way to measure size is with football fields and height with Empire State Buildings, Texas's is just weird.
I was in the US Coast Guard in the 70's in this area and I remember when we came upon it the first time. It was appalling and about a mile wide. Just tens of thousands of six-pack plastics and garbage. That's in addition to all the oil leaked by freighters whenever they came into LA. The whole ocean had those glimmers of oil patches everywhere. I don't know how the fish are able to breathe.
if that was in the 70s I don't think I want to know how bad it is now.
@@malcolmotoole it’s probably not as bad actually, i think there’s more environmental laws now
@@rafangille Regardless, plastic production and consumption has increased massively every year, and into other countries which don't have good pollution regulations. Production of clothing with synthetic fibers like polyester which release micro-plastics into water systems has increased massively in the last 50 years. I bet the level of micro-plastics in drinking water is probably higher than ever. Anecdotally, everytime I go to the lakes and rivers where i live i can pick up a few pocketfuls of plastic litter. I think you're probably right though that we don't have so much oil leaking out of ships and that kind of stuff though nowadays.
All we have done for YEARS is study the problem, all that money could've been for clean up.
@@oeautobody3586 yep..then an 18 yr old kid came along with his ocean cleaning robot..
Kinda scary to think how much plastic we produce while taking barely any action. This issue is becoming a task for future generations sadly.
And that is why the problem persists.. It is a task for our current generation, NOT for future generations.
Because I'm not famous like other singers that's why no one see my singing videos. Just see once❤.......
@@callistoarmy5576 no
We should be charging the corporations that produce all of this waste a fee to clean up this mess.
An impossible task..
We definitely need some initiatives from individuals AS WELL AS corporations and governments to really address this issue in a sustainable way!
Yeah go after China 🇨🇳
My dad always taught me don’t just look at it . Pick it up . This should be all of our mindset . Even the camera crew
Pick it up and put it where though?? Consolidated trash
It’s so frustrating knowing that local recycling centers only take CERTAIN types of plastic. This country needs to do something beyond ‘picking it up’ and cleaning....
Hemp cellulose plastic is the future, more hemp in all industries would help. Along with cleaning. As for landfills, the future will see plastic eating bacteria and fungus. Just Say No to oil and plastic, and say yes to hemp.
Especially since every plastic is technically recyclable. It's just not always profitable to do, which is why they don't bother.
@@StrokeMahEgo Anything is technically recyclable. With enough time and energy anything can be broken down to its constituents, but that's exactly the problem, plastic creates a lot of pollution when it's made, and then a whole lot more when it's 'recycled', it doesn't go into a magic box and come out the the other side a bottle, that takes energy.
@@StrokeMahEgo which goes to show they're more concerned about the money which is not the right kind of attitude for this. Don't worry so much about the money and focus more on improving waste management.
@@jakep9643 There's tens of thousands of different "plastics", I doubt there will ever be a bacteria capable of eating plastic im general.
Let's appreciate the work those researchers and volunteers are doing!
Appreciation of their work is not enough. Each one of us has to use at least a tiny bit less of plastics and produce less garbage in general. That includes me and YOU reading this.
@Joe Blow why
@Joe Blow fair enough
@Joe Blow ily
@Joe Blow i don't get the joke
I remember sometimes camping at this place we called Garbage Beach in Hawai'i. The garbage was more sun bleached and rubbed down like sea glass, and rather pretty in terms of plastic trash. You could see that so much of had come from Asia based on writing on some objects. As well, some you could see was from the 90s or 80s. Craziness...
We need to penalize the companies for selling the plastics. They are the ones making the money off this.
"Take another look at plastic". If you're old like me, you might remember these words from the 1970s. This AD campaign was used to try to get everyone to accept this great new material. If only we could have seen the future. Now we are certainly injesting it in the seafood we consume. And the story isn't over. More bad news to come...
You hit the nail on the head I've seen a video of looking at canned tuna fish under a microscope, it has microplastic strands in it sadly (it can be assumed that it's plastic that the tuna fish digested)
Like nuclear waste or oil spills.
Bible was right.
Exxon knew
trees were like this as well in the past... Nothing could really digest the newly developed lignin and they were just piling up for about 140 millions years!!! Over those 140 million years they "sank into the ground" and became oil. Now we use the same oil to create another substance that can't be naturally broken down and the cycle continues :P
While I agree with general video message, I don't think we exclusively should be the ones to clean up this mess. Big corporations that are key drivers of this for years tried to blame it on the little guy. We should hold them accountable for their actions, through taxes and other redeeming incentives.
I wish they included this in the video
And what are big corporations made of? That's right, people.
@@legrandliseurtri7495 and?
Huge companies such as those that make bottled water, plastic bags, retail companies should be the ones to clean up their mess. They make profit out of these products. They are responsible.
Big corporations make these products because the little guy buys them. So the blame is on everyone and the responsibility to clean is on everyone too
Vox does a really good job at packing lost of information into a short video. definitely will be volunteering at plastic clean ups
the funniest thing to me is that ocean clean up is put in plastic bags. People are so dependent on plastic that they use more plastic to clean up plastic
I carry a trash bag with me anytime I go to the beach or hiking! I recommend everyone do it even if it's small EDIT: I use biodegradable/compostable bags. I didn't know picking up trash was so controversial 😂
Same here, i always have one in my car along with a fresh set of gloves and a grabby stick and also carry a mesh bag when scuba diving since everytime i dive i find at least one product of pollution.
I do the same. Also while fishing. Its RIDICULOUS how much trash I pick up while fishing. I'll completely clean one spot, come back a month later an it's like I never cleaned it at all. I hate people.
@@roninmbattousai yes! That's awesome!
The problem is what happens with the bag of trash after you discard it in a bin. Chances are it's being sold to a poor country that then dumps it into the ocean
@@AlecsNeo Totally agree that it isn't the right approach fully as refusal is the first and most critical step. But even if it is slightly delayed or has the possibility to be processed correctly then the effort is worth it. Now for at least the states, there is a pretty solid chance that the trash will be properly handled to a landfill if you process to trash (since we aren't talking about the massive problem with the recycling industry as a whole as well), which of course then you are trading up issues with the ocean for issues with the fresh water and soil areas. If you separate to recycling then it is dependent on a few more factors beyond that. So yeah, it's definitely not the best but really without there being overall less of us or more of us caring about the issues/doing our small part if possible then it will never improve regardless. Plastic should be heavily reduced in its manufacturing for anything real to change in a lifetime (which requires people to not have convience which is the primary reason for nothing to change).
Thanks Laura, great video & insight into this issue as always. In fact, our underwater wildlife videographers are experiencing a tremendous increase of the impact on ocean ecosystems stemming from plastic pollution. And it comes down to the unsighted. You mention the most common origins of plastic pollution at around 08:00, yet what almost nobody is aware of, is that our clothes are also full with it and cause a flood of plastic garbage.
really good point. I honestly didn't know about the microplastics in our clothes until kind of recently, which just puts into perspective how destructive/wasteful i was being before i realized that.
Hallo
But this is not enough, you should check "seaspiracy" and spread the real message
@@dontcheckmychannel6206 ur name tho
@@saulgonzalez6427 do you love eggs
Thank you for doing this amazing and very important job!!!!
I learned a few years ago about an organization called, "4 Oceans". They do an incredible job of cleaning up beaches all over the planet that has plastic trash. This gives me hope seeing and hearing about these organizations that are doing this work.
Those organizations are just there to distract people from the real polluters.
@@darkhelmet12e47 Well I wouldn't exactly call them a distraction if they are doing some good by cleaning up plastic pollution.
1900: picking up shells from the beaches 2010: picking up trash from the beaches Edit: *Plastic trash
even before during the 20th and 19th Century, plastic pollution in ocean already exist, that's all started during Industrial Revolution
When I was a kid I was collecting glass shards on beach. Since they were smoothed by sand they weren't dangerous for a child to touch but still. I was basically collecting trash
@@angelikaskoroszyn8495 same. We called it sea glass. I have at least a bucket full, luckily I haven’t been able to find any more, since the beach near me banned glass bottles and other trash
@@angelikaskoroszyn8495, although, glass is just a rock, so you could make the same trash collecting claim about collecting pebbles you suspect of being formed from bricks etc.
I guess they pick up my dancing skills
Gift from us to next generations. The full time job of our kids cleaning up our mess.
Interestingly enough this actually happened once before. When plants first evolved cellulose and lignin there was nothing that could break it down and so dead plants just kept piling up without decaying. It took around 60 million years for microbes that could break the stuff down arrived and plant finaly started decaying again. Anyway long story short this is where around 90% of coal came from.
Don't have kids then
@@franklee8478 he means future generations you dimwitted pinecone
@@akshatshah3717I know, I'm not talking about him. People in general should not have kids.
@@franklee8478 ok
I spent 16 years in the Navy between 1978 and 1994 and was stationed in San Diego, I have floated through the area where the great pacific dump is supposed to be many tines going to and from deployments and exercises and have never seen that.
Let's hear it for TeamSeas raising $30 million to get 30 million pounds of plastic from the ocean, including beach clean ups!
The worst thing is when your country has the resources to construct facilities to process plastic wastes, and does not do it, instead just land filling it all~ Recently a garbage dump near my house has caught fire, explaining the smells of burning plastic for the past few days
Is this in Japan?
@@earledward8766 japan uses a lot of plastics, in konbini, cafes, any product has plastics yea we have these recycling things but still its better to reduce than keep using i think
@@user-bz7is1kg4r is your profile pic the default pic from Google?
@@fahimp3 No, he lives in Malaysia.
@@fahimp3 Probably. Japan is the #1 exporter of plastic waste in the world, and has been for a while.
A shout out to the Dutch, who are specialists in cleaning Oceans! We need more of them!
We don’t need more of them , we should be like them
We don’t need more of them , we should be like them and learn from them
Exactly!
@@moller4u they also produce plenty of their own. I'd say the US military budget if reduced by just 2% could help clean up half of their own coasts. similarly if most europeans stopped selling weapons across the globe for a year at least we could manage this crisis.
No theyre not 😂
Thank you for this video. It makes a heck of a lot of sense.
When I was a young kid in the late 80's and early 90's I remember my Dad saying that we will have this problem when everything was glass. Glass is a easier to recycle and reuse. We sometimes need to turn the clock back to what worked before.
Big corporations need to foot the bill for the clean-up - it is their mess after all.
Vuyo, and the entire military complex of america. that alone has the GPD of canada.
I mean it should be China's responsibility, they pollute more plastics than anyone else. Military budget has nothing to do with the economics of pollution. You pollute less there's less pollution. We just need to make countries responsible for their pollution. And that's asia, asia is the largest plastic pollution contributor with China leading with a large margin. If we can successfully regulate China's plastic pollution we could prevent around 8,000,000 tonnes of plastic entering the waters. Vox is clearly being funded at some level by a Chinese person or else the conclusion to this video would have been we need to regulate asia on being the leaders in plastic pollution
NO SHUT UP. Its OUR problem, america can be great again if you guys stop blaming others
@@zedantXiang yes but Asia accounts for most of the worlds pollution alone even if we went to 0% carbon today we would still need other countries help.
Coke forces you to drink their product and then throw the empty bottle off a pier? Okay.
So scary and so sad. Most of the world is either ignorant, doesn’t care, or simply doesn’t realise the impact is so big.
The vast majority of ocean plastic pollution is due to third world countries using their rivers as garbage dumps, start there. All of you people that are using reusable straws and bags are doing literally nothing except making yourselves feel morally superior.
@@kjjosker Those people who sort their garbage religiously for recycling are suckers for yet another juicy international racket that sees much of their junk dumped anywhere, indiscriminately.
Yeah, they don’t care sadly
It's preparation for end of all days. Every living beings except humans wil start to become extinct and the the day of reckoning will happen. It's coming near
People will only care when they are directly affected and when things get really really worse, that's why whenever I see people throw their trash in the sea near my house I get so angry but I know that no matter how much I try to persuade them to avoid doing it they won't listen because they feel that they are being attacked personally, like, what the actual dumbfuckery.
We've got to start to didposing of plastic responsibly, even it were jus meled down and conglomerated into blocks that could be buried somewhere this would be a great improvement.
Thanks for this short education..very well done.
There are companies that are cleaning it up, but what we really need to do is go back to using glass in what we can.
Plastic is the way to go, but only if humanity can operate this properly. Most of the outcome we observe is the reason of one way policy. Recycling is called such for a reason.
Unfortunately glass takes more energy to make.
@@sehleh3194 however recycling has proved inefficient and most countries cant keep up with the demand in plastic waste so they used to sell their garbage.
Horrible idea. Littered broken glass lasts forever. As in like thousands of years. I could take you to dozens of places in the desert where careless people have left tons of broken glass. Some of it hasn’t moved in over 30 years, and hasn’t degraded one iota.
@@hassmanSMO Looks for me as one whole another topic of descussion. If one country can afford recycling garbage it's all about structuring the system which will work well every way possible. Only two ingredients needed such as money and desire to be efficient. Easily may be wrong im not any kind of closeby to any of this :)
I colletted 15kg of plastic and garbage with my gf on Apr 18th, it was Italy national plastic free day. Let's redo it all together on the international one on July the 3rd and clean it up! :D 10kg from each of us every year and we can defeat this mess
What did you do with it tho? A recycle center?
@@idk._.9958 We recycle daily trash in Italy but you can't do it with this 'cause deteriorated materials aren't recycable at all. Or if there's a way, our current system doesn't cover it. So we bring it to the dump. Not ideal, i know, but better then leave it in our forests.
@@lorenzomanini1017 But how did you collect all this stuff?? Like in a truck or something else?? And was it not difficult for 2 people to collect this amount of plastic? (BTW great job)
Grazie mille 🙏
@@vinitkarankal9481 Ahah no no i said we collected both plastic and other types of garbage 😂 so there was also heavyer stuff than plastic. Aproximately it was a bit less than a cube meter.
The ocean cleanup project also cleans up where rivers meet the ocean, dealing with another large portion of plastics at coast lines. I don't see how we will ever clean the sedimentary plastics or the macroplastics at the bottom of the ocean though.
Great initiative... Really noble🙏🙏
This is actually semi-positive news. The main problem with the ocean garbage patches is that they are not easy to clean up. The beach cleanup operations are actually a bit easier to do.
@A B how so?
Do you actually think we will ever clean any of this? We have way more pressing problems like stopping the dumping of plastic into the ocean and that would be easy to fix compared to combing trough billions and billions of hectares of ocean for micro plastic.
@@jholotanbest2688 best way to start is to pick up litter you see on the street
@sen touji I guess dumping was the wrong word. I didn't mean that we should line our shores with police stopping dump trucks. I meant that we should first address how all of this plastic is getting into to the ocean in the first place. And the only real solution to that problem is to reduce the amount of plastic we use.
@@jholotanbest2688 it would obviously be a matter of priority and ease. If there was ever an effort to clean up. We would first clean up what is the easiest to get to. It's much easier/cheaper to get it at the coastline than in the vast ocean. -600,000 km of coastline. -350,000,000 square km of ocean. Which sounds easier to clean to you? Yes, we need to stop excessive use of plastic. But, it doesn't mean we just dismiss the problem of ocean plastic.
"The actions of what we do may not affect us now. But it will affect us later."
Exactly
maybe
The "First Nations" people of the USA tried to teach respect for seven generations. Shameful that so many people ignored that wisdom.
Wow, very groundbreaking stuff
"A circle has no corners"
An eye opener for me was being in a sea bird rookery and seeing how much plastic was in the guano. At first I thought it was crustacean shells until I saw the various colors. As much plastic as manure.
I would love to partake in this activity, I just try to do my best/part at home.🤔 Keep up the good work I'm rooting for you guys.
before pandemic came, I used to always go to various beaches in my country with my family every school break, and then i went to one beach and i was on my way to the car and saw local people who live and work like opening shops close to the beach are burrying their trash in the beach 😭 they literally dug big holes at the beach and burry the trash, and not just one person who did that but many
omg where is this
@@vwgl1169 it's one of the beaches in jember, Indonesia but i forgot the name tho :(
That's so sad I wonder if they know the harms it could do :(
Omg they’re literally like,”if I can’t see it, they don’t exist,” 😭😭😭
This is why this is a never ending problem you will never ever get rid of all the plastic and garbage from our oceans because PEOPLE ARE LITTER BUGS 🐛 and might I add PEOPLE ARE DISGUSTING
“It’s only one straw,” said 8 billion people. 😔
Better than throwing out 8 billion steel straws.
@@jnuval just drink it from the glass
@@jnuval Steel straws are reusable. And plus, people dont use one plastic straw, they use hundreds if not thousands in their life.
Plastic straws account for very little of ocean plastic waste. Mostly because they're easily recycled.
@@somethung8188 I've already thrown out multiple "reusable" straws because even with the cleaning brush, it still doesn't clean properly.
Companies that sell drinks in bottles in plastic could be making them thinner. That would reduce plastic pollution and cut costs
Very Informative report here thank you!
So, are we going to just going to study this forever or are we going to clean it up?
It's not that easy to just "clean it up". No matter how many times we clean up our ocean, our annual emission of plastic into the ocean will negate any efforts we put into "clean up". For now studying how plastic pollution effects our ecosystem and where our plastic pollution ends up at is the best course of action in cleaning up our garbage patch. We need to reduce our trash and reduce use of plastics before we can clean up our ocean. Whatever clean up we commit to, we need to change our economy around plastics.
@@kawaiidoggo I understand that but I don't know how many times I have seen 'studies' being done on this massive floating island of garbage... Instead of studying it, let's clean it up and figure a way to keep it out of the ocean...
@@kawaiidoggo That's b.s. BOTH cleaning the ocean and studying are key, not one or the other. Negligible improvements are still better than 0 improvements
@@FIXTREME yes you are correct. But at the rate of plastic polluting our ocean, it's better to understand all our alternatives. Taking actions creates an effect. In order to clean up the amount of garbage in our ocean, we will have to take a magnitude of energy so great that it can be detrimental to our climate. Studying for right now is best course of action. Why? When we finally understand, how much plastic is impacting our entire ocean, we will understand where we should mitigate plastic dumps. Should it be before we dump into ocean? Probably yes. But if it's in our ocean, at what point is it energy efficient and cost saving to clean up our ocean? These questions are still up to debate. Yeah we are currently taking considerable amount of energy and effort to clean up our ocean. But even we massive organizational effort and governmental support, we aren't really seeing any changes. Studies are best way to see how to deal with this situation. We have too limited understanding of our ocean current and ocean ecology that we can't comprehend how much "clean up" we need. I'm not saying we should halt any effort to clean up our ocean but we shouldn't make it bigger than deal than scientific studies into our ocean ecology. We barely scratch the surface on ocean ecology. We only know on the surface on how plastic affects our ecology. Shouldn't we probably get a bigger picture before we can create problem we didn't intent?
Talking about IT makes more money for this Organization.. We need to have the FACT CHECKERS look into THIS ISSUE.. The Operators of VOX is making a TON of Money off of producing this STUFF.. There a lot of money to be made by telling people what They are doing wrong..
I feel like penalising companies that produce plastic, and making them fund the beach cleanups and ocean clean ups
Who buys from companies that produce plastics?
Should punish both
@@nicholassteenkamp7621 both the cleanups and the companies?
@@Name56784 no the beach and the companies
Start with the DuPont corporation. They started it. They also helped suppress biodegradable non toxic Hemp based alternatives
that’s why i find it hilarious that my school had a researcher come present just to tell us plastic wasn’t an issue we had to worry about, as if we aren’t informed in other ways
Cleaning up part did make me feel a bit better. 😊
In high school I was told that the size of the garbage patch was the size of Texas, and now it’s Australia? That’s unsettling.
I really didn’t want to be that guy who corrects people, but idk if this is a joke moment or not. They said in the description that it’s twice the size of Texas not Australia.
plus also 5 such ocean garbage patches, not just one.
I like your anime pfp
@@tophatmetagross1497 twice the size of Texas is roughly the size of Australia
@@ace_stallion "Texas is approximately 678,052 sq km, while Australia is approximately 7,741,220 sq km, making Australia 1,042% larger than Texas." 2 seconds to google :)
imagine the amount of masks in the ocean…
Right!
And every one of them not a N95 was completely worthless in stopping Covid-84.
@@drawingdead9025 covid-84,!?!?!?!?!?!!!!
I went to Sarasota last week and their were cloth masks already in the water
@@drawingdead9025 In what way do they hit close to home for the democrats? I don't believe they incited an insurrection against democracy.
Excellent report.
Good video. Hopefully everyone does their part so we can all together do a small part that we owe this grand planet.
The sad thing is.. we won't do anything about it ( at a required scale ) cause we're so focused on the politics and greed and other problems that we'll not realise the damage until it's too late.
just like climate change it'll be too little too late.
Yes we live in a capitalist society this is nothing new
@@thatlawnmowerguy9 @0xsergy true
@@0xsergy yup
Capitalism bad, me no like society. And I can't say I disagree.
When I was a child, I saw sea shells on the beach. Now children see plastics. Very sad. WTG everyone, especially volunteers, who picks up beach trash.
I'm 26 now. When I was a child, I saw tonnes of plastic on the Seashore. It has been a while I went to the beach. I can't Imagine how much more plastic is there now.
That’s life. Welcome.
I pick up trash when I go to the shore, but I also find shells and beach treasures. Maybe people need to be more mindful with their trash.
I go to the beach a lot you need your city to do their job if your beach is not clean. That sounds like a local issue
Sorry just too many contradictions
Did anyone else get an ad for USP plastic bottles before this video? I live how tone-deaf KZhead ads are sometimes. Truly incredible.
So, you pick up the plastic on the beach, throw it into the trash, and it ends up back in the ocean again?
Thank you for making this video. The oceans are incredibly important to the Earth and people should be aware of how bad it’s getting hit by our waste and negligence.
If you have Netflix... I really recommend Sea-piracy.
Watching this and talking about it on the internet isn't gonna help anything lol
And by having awareness, we can send out "waves of good vibes" with our "desires" for this to get better!
I don’t live by an ocean but anytime I’m visiting one, my mom and I always pick up trash which I’ve noticed usually gets people near us to pick up trash too! So sad to think what we’ve done to ourselves 😕
We didn't do this, subhumans did
@@tubeguy4066 we have a bit of subhuman in all of us
@@knightmor- Don't blame the average person for this
@@sinistargaming The average person consumes fossil fuels.
@@tubeguy4066 i blame you personally for this.
I recycle religiously. Yet I've seen articles saying very little plastics ARE recyclable ! WTH OVER ?
This is really good news actually. The plastic is relatively inert. Once on the bottom it is no more harmless than a rock.
Imagine mixing salt and pepper together. Now imagine trying to separate the salt and pepper after they've been mixed together. That's the task we face.
@Jamie B Yea, except it is young people who are gung-ho and deeply invested in this problem where as the older generations caused it and keep denying it. Get off your pedestal grandpa. You're the problem. The overwhelming majority of people under 30 believe in climate change, support policy like the Green New Deal, support holding corporations accountable, and constantly push for solving the plastic problem.
That would actually be pretty easy. Dissolve the salt in water then strain out the pepper from the mixture, allow water to dry, you have just separated salt and pepper. Lol 😆
@@Thorgard360 you're a genius 👏🙌✨👌❤♥
@@obsoleteoptics Nah he just took introductory chemistry.
@@Thorgard360 ok now how do we solve the plastic in the ocean problem??
My friend visited India, Bangalore, considered to be one if the most developed cities in India. He took pictures of people bulldozing(literally using heavy machinery at dump sites located next to rivers) trash into rivers in the middle of the city. If that can't be stopped, banning straws in US is not doing anything.
@Nekes12 War is not very environmental.
Its weird that they say most of the plastics are from us individuals, but the footage shows they are picking fishing nets, and large boxes, which are used by industries!!
This is quite a comprehensive coverage of this huge problem. I have been following TheOceanCleanup's team work and they are doing an incredible job. Please make an update video on this world to inform the world about the current state of affairs and how people can be a part of it.
Framing this as a mystery really helped me connect with the video. Good educational storytelling!
Unpopular possible solution: require food companies to use less plastic in their products, and yes I am talking about you Lays!😤
Majority of Plastic waste is Fishing Nets though
thats not enough. every corporation should be part of the government. this way we can ensure we do away with plastic.
@@anwpecirotan they say that, but what is it you find most washed up? surely if fishing nets were so the majority then why is it a minority that is found as waste? bottled plastics and random broken down plastics are mostly what i see along the beaches i live near.
@@Dockhead did you guys even watch the video? Not all pollution is in the same place. Out at sea you’re gonna have more nets and things trapped by the currents and by the shores your gonna see bottles and such.
@@Dockhead go and watch seaspiracy on Netflix if you haven’t already. If you like eating fish, you may change your mind after watching that.
That shot of you digging in the sand is heartbreaking. Even when I was little it was present, but usually small blue flakes from tarps, not that huge mass. That’s only going to get worse :(
Thank you! We need to get merchandizers to change from plastic to paper wrappings. And same for take--out restaurants.
0:04 Texas is now the new official measuring standard
I need to know how many Toyota Corollas that is, or how many baby elephants.
They will use any measuring standard except the metric system
This is kind of a good news. If most of them are close to the shore or on the shore, then cleaning them would be a lot easier than when most of them are in the bottom or middle of the ocean. We should act fast than wait for them to get carried further when cleaning becomes more expensive.
Spoiler: We will Not clean it.
Yes, amazing
@@davidschut9905 come on! I was excited for the new earth arc!
This new environmental documentary exposes the secret to all this: the Connections (2021)
Thank U Jina!
Plastic / toxins from oil production ( pollution )!
It made me sad to see a laundry basket in “perfect” condition, it’s not cracked and still works as a laundry basket, yet someone, in some part of the world decided that it didn’t serve its purpose any more, and that they didn’t need it any longer, and just went ahead and tossed it, without ever knowing that it would end up in the ocean. Please, always be conscious of the plastic you acquire and how you get rid of it, even if you use it for many many years, it still will have 500+ more years on earth.
Very informative!
This is what i should do if i see a verified person commented
Some of you might be interested in this new environmental documentary: The Connections (2021)
Not really since the video completely neglected that the main source for plastic in the ocean is from ocean going vessels and fishery. In the Norwegian part, of the cleanup referred in the video, it counted for close to 60% of the total. Also the that part embeded in sediments on the ocean floor will not enter into any cycle we care about for a very, very long time.
@@bknesheim The same people that are fomenting racial strife and the same people that are telling you to trust their health criteria are the same ones perpetuating this lie to cause fear, and fear divides people. Consider the facts. Published in the, "Journal of Hazardous Materials", plastic polymers exposed to sunlight while immersed in ocean water for two months degraded and dissolved at a higher rate than anyone thought possible; at 2.7 years, half of the plastics were dissolved. Furthermore, most of the plastic garbage comes from China, accounting for about 8.8 million tons per year, as compared with the U.S. at only 0.3 million tons. ~ quotes: "Ocean Plastics", "Liberty Nation", Nov. 14, 2019.
If most of it is on or near the shore, that should make it easier to clean up. So let's get to it.
Not really sure of that 😕 If it's on the middle of the ocean, sure it's more difficult to go there, but then you can remove tons of plastic in very little time. On the coast, you can't juste throw a net... so you need to pick all the trash by hand... thus needing a lot of people to remove it little by little That said, it's not a reason not to do it
you haven't count the microplastic in everyone's body yet. (scientist found that even the deepest and smallest sea creatures had microplastic in them, and they are at the lowest food chain. let that sink in (pun unintended))
no one has claimed it is mostly on or near the shore, you will close your studio at once
@@ManomiiFox This comment just made me go on a 10 minute searching spree about microplastics in my body. Now I have anxiety.
yes yes yes!! Why isnt this shown on all the worlds TV? This should be out there for all to see!
great work team
I find it interesting that the script never mentions fishing nets specifically, despite the fact that they are one of the most abundant (and dangerous to wildlife) sources of plastic pollution floating around, as you can see in the footage of the Ocean Cleanup shown in the video. Still, very good video!
okay we know you have watched seaspiracy...
@@hiteshbonde1 hahaha I have indeed, but I already knew it from speaking to researchers (I'm studying to become a marine biologist at the moment).
@@hiteshbonde1 Vox watched Seaspiricy too. Are they ignoring the key points because critics were able to find little details questionable?
@@pyRoy6 And the NGOs represented but yes blame critics
@@pyRoy6 Vox literally had a NGO spew misinformation by writing an article on their website in regards to Seaspiracy - more likely pressured as they get paid
Great video, but you should also make a video or at least a section in this one, about how the corporations who initially produced and introduced these plastics are not taking responsibility for forcing consumers to use it.
Heyy I am making a video about this topic rn haha
agree
It's the consumer who buys the product, creates the market and litter. People love to blame the big companies
@@AVI.D go to the supermarket and buy 10 items. Tell me you’re not walking home with at least one piece of plastic packaging.
That's capitalism for ya
Next time I go to the beach I will bring a bag to pick up plastic. Usually I don’t see any though. Thanks for sharing your video.
In the 80's they used to sieve the tourist beaches here mechanically for say a 20 cm deep or so to remove all the cigarette buds and (then) can opening lids. I wonder if they still do that and if its suitable for other sandy beaches
Thanks for addressing this critical issue. We need to first reduce the amount of plastics in everyday consumption, before reusing and recycling them.
Sadly in its current form recycling is a non tenable joke. We were duped by the companies with the recycling push in the 90's into buying more plastic because "it can be recycled" but they never really had systems in place for it. Re-use is by far the best method after and during reduction. Most plastic just isn't recyclable into anything outside of grocery bags. Sorry for the dissertation but this is a subject I have be yelling to my piers and elders about since I was a teen in the late 90's and no one listened.
What about fishing equipment?
The vast majority of ocean plastic pollution is due to third world countries using their rivers as garbage dumps... start there. All of you people that are using reusable straws and bags are doing literally nothing except making yourselves feel morally superior.
@@kjjosker it's a start.
It's really annoying with COVID-19 I am banned from using reusable shopping bags because they might "spread disease" but it's perfectly OK for anyone to bring a my cell phone and purse in the grocery store. My reusable shopping bags might as well be sterilized surgery implements in comparison to the bacteria-ridden surfaces of smart phones or the inside of a purse teeming with bacteria. They're filthier than gas pump handles.
I was cycling home after a long day of work and when I looked into the canal I was cycling past I saw a nest and the baby ducks were sitting on a nest made of sticks, plastic bottles, plastic bags and other things. It was really sad to see.
It's good they are using it as a building material! As long as it's still got some use, it's not trash.
Great, they already start recycling. Best thing about it: this plastic nest will last hundred years.
@Akshay 14 We need to do something about this, God can't do all the work.
I have a friend that worked on a research ship studying the Pacific garbage. And most of it had Japanese markings. That came after the big tsunami. But some countries still use the oceans as their garbage pits.
I've lived in N Y C, back in the early seventies, I remember reading in the news paper, that the garbage, from the city, was transported to Staten Island, where it was loaded into barges, and taken out to sea, where it was dumped, even back then it was very saddening to read about it 🙏❤️🙏
How idiotic...they were not solving the problem, but just making it worse.
Healing the world. Every government should have a program like this. We share one planet.
Don't count on China or India to do anything.
When I was a kid I used to think, “Adults are so responsible, like; they always know what to do.” How mistaken a man can be...
@@frankherman5195 or the us too
Hey guys. Would you be okay with living in a home built with well designed bricks, made with plastic and sand?
that is most unrealistic way to see reality
On my last trip to Cuba, on the Atlantic side, I scooped up a random handful of beach sand at the waterline. It was speckled with tiny plastic particles. Most no larger than the grains of sand they were in. Sickening.
never happened
@@bc1173 0K, Mr.Troll. You should know!
What beach btw?
I agree 😔
Back in the day, when I was chillin' with MJ and the little one from the Beetles, we found a starfish at the shoreline of MJs multimillion dollar mansion. Turns out it was plastic. Sickening.
7:17 "the easiest way to get plastic like this out of the ocean" - food wealth - "is to prevent it from entering in the first place…"
This always horifies me, even tho I dont live in a seashore state, but in Czechia. And yes, I see some polution here as well, but its not as much as in the ocean. I also see its getting little better, but slowly, too slowly. Its better to replace useless parts of products with paper, which at least disolves into a wooden fiber mess , than nothing. But I think that if every country doesnt help, we will never beat that problem. In the EU, here its done a lot of recycling, but for example in the africa or USA not too much or totally not, and thats the main problem in the present I think....