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Microplastics: A Small Problem with Big Consequences

Adrienne

Let’s say it’s a sunny summer day, and you’re at the beach. The sun is starting wheel towards the western horizon, the air is losing some of its heat, and the whole sky is aflame. You feel a grumble of hunger, and decide it would be a great time to get some dinner. And you know what would be perfect right now? Seafood.


Half an hour later, you are busily tucking in to a table while a waiter flourishes a menu under your nose.


“What’s the fish of the day?” you ask him.


“Ah, it’s a grilled ahi, just caught today!” he replies enthusiastically.


“Really?,” you say. “How is it?”


“Pretty good. Just a slight aftertaste of plastic.”


“…Plastic?”


“Yes. But only just slightly. You barely notice it.”


Sounds kind of gross to you. You take a different tack. “Ah, okay. How about the cod. That looks pretty good.”


“It is!” he says. “Just the faintest flavor of Saran wrap.”


“What?!” You’re not sure what’s going on here, but your appetite is quickly leaving you. You thank the waiter, making some excuse about not quite feeling seafood tonight, and make an escape. Maybe the burger place down the street will have options that don’t taste like Tupperware…

----

An extreme story? Maybe, or maybe not. In fact, a world in which our meat and seafood (and maybe ourselves) is part plastic is not too far off. That’s because of tiny little things called microplastics. They’re everywhere, and they’re worming their way into our daily lives in more ways than you know.


What Are Microplastics?


Microplastics were once big plastics, the kind you encounter every day: computers, shopping bags, home furnishings, and so on. They come from single-use items like water and soda bottles, and utensils. They can also come from little threads on your clothes, many of which are made of nylon or polyester (both plastics!). Basically, if it’s made of plastic, it can (and probably will) become a microplastic.


Plastics are synthesized from carbon-rich crude oil by isolating certain carbon compounds. People love plastics because, once formed, they are non-reactive, meaning that they won’t disintegrate when they come into contact with a wide range of acids and chemicals. Unfortunately, this also means that the suckers don’t biodegrade easily – plastic can take up to 1,000 years to degrade.


This long life poses several problems. The first is that because we use plastic so abundantly, and because it takes so long to degrade, all that plastic-based trash is piling up. The second is that, as that plastic trash sits around, it does break apart – not decomposing, but just being shredded, crushed, ground down into smaller and smaller pieces that are less visible to our eye, but are still undeniably plastic. These little pieces of plastic easily find their way into the environment where they wreak havoc – for example, being washed into oceans and waterways, where they are consumed by fish, birds, and other animals who mistake them for the marine life they like to eat. It can also get into the soil we grow veggies in, the feed we give to livestock, and even our drinking water supply.


A Rainbow Runner in the North Pacific Gyre that had ingested 18 pieces of plastic (2008). Credit: Dr. Marcus Eriksen Gyres Institute

Okay, not ideal. But will eating plastic really harm an animal or human all that much?

Yeah, it could.


Scientists are just beginning to understand the impact of microplastics on human and animal life, and on the environment as a whole. In conducting studies on mussels, researchers from the University of New South Wales found that ingested microplastics don’t just pass through the digestive system. Instead, they can linger in the digestive tract and work their way into the bloodstream and other organs. The effects are not pleasant: “scientists have observed signs of physical damage, such as inflammation, caused by particles jabbing and rubbing against organ walls. Researchers have also found signs that ingested microplastics can leach hazardous chemicals, both those added to polymers during production and environmental pollutants like pesticides that are attracted to the surface of plastic, leading to health effects such as liver damage.”


As researchers accumulate more data, “we start realizing we’re just at the tip of the iceberg with the problem.”

It’s still unclear what long-term effects microplastics might have on living organisms, or how these effects might impact the holistic environment. One hugely damaging effect could be decreased fish populations: in mistaking microplastics for food, young, newly hatched fish won’t get the calories they need to grow. That missing link in the food chain could endanger the larger fish who rely on them for food, and could ultimately impact a human food source.

So what can I - just one person! - possibly do about this?


It is impossible to overstate the negative impacts of plastic on our environment. Aside from being ingested by humans and animals, the mere fact that plastics take so long to degrade makes them a waste challenge. That’s why the best thing you can do is to follow the three R’s: Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle.


  • Reduce: somehow this first R gets forgotten. But it is by far the most important! Take note of how many plastic products you use every day, from packaging to electronics to clothing. Make conscious efforts to reduce your use of these plastics (luckily for you, this blog has a bunch of suggestions!). Reducing your use of plastic is the first and most crucial step in reducing microplastics.

  • Reuse: again, another R that gets forgotten! Our consumption culture conditions us to toss plastic items, but many of them can be reused: yogurt tubs can be washed and used to store food, plastic shopping bags can be saved and reused at the grocery store. Be creative with your plastic – just make sure you wash it first.

  • Recycle: you were waiting for this one, huh? Recycling can help ensure that plastics continue a useful life. But make sure that you’re recycling correctly, or all that plastic could end up in a landfill!

A final word about microplastics: when you consider the tiny-but-large scale of the problem, it can seem like your individual actions are too small to make a difference. And alone, they are too small. But it is the ripple effect of collective action that will make a difference. If you, and your family, and your friends, and your community start reducing, reusing, and recycling plastics, that is a huge impact. That kind of behavior could send a message to companies that consumers no longer want to use plastic products in such great quantities. It could send a signal to city governments that they need to increase the funding for local recycling centers.


The number one way to get rid of microplastics is to change your habits – and convince someone else to change their habits, too. Together is the only way we make change.



Credit: Amanda Montañez; Source: “Sources, Fate and Effects of Microplastics in the Marine Environment: A Global Assessment,” edited by Peter J. Kershaw, (IMO/FAO/UNESCO-IOC/UNIDO/WMO/IAEA/UN/UNEP/UNDP Joint Group of Experts on the Scientific Aspects of Marine Environmental Protection), GESAMP Reports and Studies, No. 90; 2015

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