Hundreds of thousands of tonnes of mismanaged waste could be blowing ashore on the ocean breeze every year, according to scientists who have discovered microplastics in sea spray.

The study, by researchers at the University of Strathclyde and the Observatoire Midi-Pyrénées at the University of Toulouse, found tiny plastic fragments in sea spray, suggesting they are being ejected by the sea in bubbles. The findings, published in the journal Plos One, cast doubt on the assumption that once in the ocean, plastic stays put, as well as on the widespread belief in the restorative power of sea breeze.

Around 359m tons of plastic was manufactured globally in 2018, and some studies suggest as much as 10% of it ends up in the sea each year.

Steve Allen, a PhD candidate at Strathclyde who co-led the study, said: “Sea breeze has traditionally been considered ‘clean air’ but this study shows surprising amounts of microplastic particles being carried by it. It appears that some plastic particles could be leaving the sea and entering the atmosphere along with sea salt, bacteria, viruses and algae.”

Read on via The Guardian

When it comes to moving home, hermit crabs are experts, often swapping shells for the optimal abode.

But now researchers have found that exposure to microplastics disrupts this key behaviour. The finds are the latest to suggest such pollution could be having an impact on the world’s marine creatures.

“Usually a so-called ‘normal’ hermit crab will always want to go for the better shell,” said Dr Gareth Arnott, co-author of the new research from Queen’s University Belfast, adding such shells are typically those of sea snails.

“The striking thing in this study was when [we offered them a better shell], lots of the crabs that had been exposed to the microplastics didn’t make the optimal decision to take [it],” he said.

Microplastics – pieces of plastic 5mm or smaller – are a growing subject of research, with previous studies showing they are present even in the depths of the ocean and are ending up in the bodies of living organisms, from seals to crabs and seabirds.

Read on via The Guardian

Roughly a thousand miles southwest of San Francisco, French long-distance swimmer Ben Lecomte is exploring one of the ocean’s most polluted places. It’s day 71 of his 80-day swim across the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a swirling repository for some 1.8 trillion pieces of plastic weighing nearly 90,000 tonnes. He's dubbed the project the Vortex Swim and his route is determined by University of Hawaii scientists using satellite imagery and ocean modelling to locate the highest concentrations of debris. When they locate a particularly trashy spot, Lecomte jumps in from his 67-foot sailboat.

In 1998, Lecomte completed what he claimed was the first swim across the Atlantic Ocean, supported by a boat, but without using a kick board. In 2018, he attempted to swim from Japan to California to complete the world’s longest swim, but after traveling 1,500 nautical miles in 165 days, he had to cancel the last leg due to damage to his support boat. He encountered so much plastic during that attempt that he was inspired to plan a swim through the epicentre of marine plastic waste.

Read on via National Geographic

en per cent of the oxygen we breathe comes from just one kind of bacteria in the ocean. Now laboratory tests have shown that these bacteria are susceptible to plastic pollution, according to a study published in Communications Biology.

"We found that exposure to chemicals leaching from plastic pollution interfered with the growth, photosynthesis and oxygen production of Prochlorococcus, the ocean's most abundant photosynthetic bacteria," says lead author and Macquarie University researcher Dr Sasha Tetu.

"Now we'd like to explore if plastic pollution is having the same impact on these microbes in the ocean."

Plastic pollution has been estimated to cause more than US$13 billion in economic damage to marine ecosystems each year, and the problem is only getting worse with marine plastic pollution estimated to outweigh fish by 2050.

Read on via EurekAlert

Humans should be proud of these inventions, for they enable us to live gently and efficiently on Earth.

Way back in 1999, American scientist and writer Donella Meadows wrote a wonderful article titled “The Seven-Plus Sustainable Wonders of the World.” In it, she described some of the most basic yet revolutionary technologies that allow humans to live gently on Earth. The original concept comes from a book by Alan Durning, director of Seattle’s Northwest Environment Watch.

Now, nearly two decades later, the list is being expanded further by the Story of Stuff project, which posted it on Facebook (where I first saw it), asking readers to weigh in on yet more sustainable wonders of the world.

So, what’s on the list?

Read on via Tree Hugger

When was the last time you thought about your breathing? Take a breath right now and think about it. You breathe because you need oxygen, a gas which makes up 21 percent of the Earth’s atmosphere. All that oxygen has to come from somewhere. You might already know that it comes from photosynthetic organisms like plants. But did you know that most of the oxygen you breathe comes from organisms in the ocean?

That’s right—more than half of the oxygen you breathe comes from marine photosynthesizers, like phytoplankton and seaweed. Both use carbon dioxide, water and energy from the sun to make food for themselves, releasing oxygen in the process. In other words, they photosynthesize. And they do it in the ocean.

Read on via Smithsonian