A World Made of Plastic
Scott Sorensen
We use it every day. Our alarm clocks
are made of it. So are the bristles on our
toothbrushes and toothpaste tubes. It makes
up the steering wheel and the tires on our
cars. Everything from the bags in the grocery
store to bottles of water is all made out of the
same thing: plastic. As I sit here writing this I’m
Beach. But instead of taking the usual windy
typing on a plastic keyboard, staring at a plastic
route following the North Pacific current he
screen next to a plastic encased computer and a
drove in a straight line through the North Pacific
plastic printer, drinking out of a plastic cup and
Gyre, an area of the Pacific with no wind. While
all of this resting on a plastic countertop. We’re
he used his motor to cross the windless expanse
surrounded by it from the everyday things we
of water, each time he went to the top of the
use to the more complex technologies, but few
mast to fix something he noticed some form of
of us give it more than a passing thought. And
plastic garbage. What Moore had discovered
the effects of plastic are making an impact on
was a garbage patch in the North Pacific Gyre
our world. A big impact.
estimated to be twice the size of Texas. “It
wasn't like an island of trash like people keep
One who knows more than most about
wanting to say,” Moore says of the discovery.
this impact is Captain Charles Moore. In August
“It's just that I couldn't survey the surface of the
of 1997 he took a voyage from Honolulu to Long
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ocean for any period of time while standing on
So how did we get into this big plastic
deck without seeing some anthropogenic
mess? First we need to understand how plastics
debris, something that was human in origin,
came about in the first place. Plastics were
float by.” (Moore) Usually the trash would be
actually made of natural materials when they
pushed down under because of the roughness
first came about in the late nineteenth century
of the water. But the water that year was
(reachoutmichigan.org). Plastic was derived
warmer than usual and the sea was calm. This
from gutta-percha (a sap from certain trees),
allowed all the plastic trash to float to the
shellac (secretions of a tiny scaled insect), and
surface. “The signs of human civilization are
animal horns. After this material is boiled in
everywhere in the ocean, and especially in
water or soaked in an alkaline solution it is than
these high-pressured gyres,” (Moore) Moore
plasticized so that it can be molded into any
says. The pollution in these high-pressured
shape desired. The word plastic, in fact, comes
gyres is just one example of how plastic is
from the Greek word plastikos, which means fit
impacting our world.
for molding, and plastos, meaning molded
(Douglas Harper). Not until 1951 did two
research chemists for Phillips Petroleum
Company discover how to make plastics
synthetically from petroleum. Polypropylene
and polyethylene, the plastics they found, are
used in most all of the plastic products we use
today. These plastics are non-biodegradable
and can last for thousands of years. Since the
1950’s, we have used and discarded one billion
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tons of plastic (Weisman), and all this waste is
scientists all around the globe. In an article
now either in landfills or found in the ocean.
about plastic pollution it tells of Thompson’s
In certain areas of the ocean, such as
the North Pacific Gyre, plastic has basically
made a soup with tiny bits of plastic
everywhere. In some parts, the plastic
outnumbers plankton 6 to 1 (Ferris). As stated
earlier, plastic doesn’t bio-degrade. Instead it
breaks down into smaller and smaller pieces
making it edible for many species of marine
wildlife. Except the animals aren’t able to digest
findings:
[Thompson] learned that on Diego
Garcia, an atoll in the Indian Ocean,
hermit crabs live in bottle caps instead
of shells. The kittiwake of northern
Denmark raises its young in a cliff nest
assembled mostly from drinking straws,
plastic twine, and ear swabs. In a 600foot-deep trench off the coast of
Marseilles, France, troves of Evian
bottles lie perfectly preserved, absent
the light or oxygen to break them apart.
The fur seals of Macquarie Island, far
off New Zealand's southern tip, poop
bits of yellow and blue. (Ferris)
it. Some birds often feast on the plastic garbage
and actually die of starvation as a result. Plastic
objects kill an estimated 100,000 marine
mammals and one million birds every year
(Ferris). It is unknown at this point whether or
not the plastic has got into our food source, but
the plastic content continues to increase and
doesn’t show any signs of slowing down.
Studies in recent years have shown just
to what extent plastic is changing wildlife. One
Kamilo Beach, a beach on the south tip
marine ecologist, Richard Thompson, has
of Hawaii, has been drastically transformed by
gathered information in recent years from
plastic pollution. Once the beach had evergreen
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logs from the Pacific Northwest washed up on
in the medical field. Certainly plastic has
its shore, but since the 1960’s, plastic started
accelerated globalization and furthered
coming with it. Ocean currents carry the trash
technology. It is also a fact that plastic is an
from North America, so basically none of the
important part of our economy, whether we
trash is from Hawaii. Just by looking at the
like it or not. The American Chemistry Council, a
beach one can see the consequences of our
defender of plastics, claims that it would take
plastic consumption. The waste goes a foot
much more energy to produce plastic
deep at some parts, and the sand on this beach
alternatives than the production of plastic
is made almost entirely of little bits of plastic.
(American Chemistry Council). But even though
(Dashefsky)
this is most likely true, our inability to dispose
Certainly the advantages of plastics
are more than being able to give us a cheap
material to work with for everyday luxuries.
Plastics make up bicycle helmets and airbags,
home insulation, and plastics are also important
of the non-biodegradable material is a problem
that can’t be ignored. It’s this problem that
environmentalists and scientists have been
trying to solve for decades.
One solution that has been tried is
recycling. Unfortunately, though, it does little to
help the problem; a mere 5% of plastics are
recycled. It has also proven to be very cost
inefficient. In 2002 Mayor Bloomberg of New
York City announced that the city would cease
recycling plastic and glass because it simply
wasn’t cost efficient. (Publishing) Plastics are so
varied that they are not easy to recycle and if
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they are they are only used in low-grade
“I am hopeful that our research will spur this
products with little market value.
visible blight to be assessed at a more serious
Another solution would be to start
using bio-degradable plastics, or “Bioplastics”.
The bioplastics are made from a product called
Mirel which is created through “genetically
modified microbes.” (Chamberlin) The material
can be molded just like regular plastic but is also
often twice as expensive as regular plastic.
level -- to create not only public outcry for
change, but also governmental awareness that
they must mandate changes in production
throughout the world,” Moore says. “We've got
to make space where we can see an alternative
because the timid solutions being proposed are
just not going to work.” (Moore)
Many companies are investing in the material,
though, and as more is learned about
bioplastics the price will likely go down.
Currently there is such a large amount
of plastic in the ocean that it is near impossible
to get it all out. There is little that can be done
about the waste that has accumulated over the
past 50 years. Many ecologists and
environmentalists say that really all we can do is
stop where we are at by using less plastic in our
everyday lives. Charles Moore is aware of our
inability to reverse what’s already been done,
and sees that change will only happen as
everyone becomes more aware of the problem.
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MLA
Works Cited
American Chemistry Council. americanchemistry.com. 2010. 2010
<http://www.americanchemistry.com/s_plastics/bin.asp?CID=1211&DID=4589&DOC=FILE.PDF>.
Chamberlin, Phil. "Unnatural Plastics." Engineering & Technology (2009).
Dashefsky, Howard. "hawaiinewsnow.com." 2007. 2010
<http://www.hawaiinewsnow.com/Global/story.asp?S=7334574>.
Douglas Harper. etymonline.com. 2010. 2010
<http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=plastic&searchmode=none>.
Ferris, David. "message in a bottle." Sierra (2009).
Mishori, Ranit. www.washingtonpost.com. 22 April 2008. 14 April 2010
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2008/04/18/AR2008041802836.html?sid=ST2008042602242>.
Moore, Charles. Captain Charles Moore Nell Greenberg. 2009.
Publishing, Campion Interactive. "the cost of recycling." Geographical (Campion Interactive Publishing)
(2005).
reachoutmichigan.org. <http://www.reachoutmichigan.org/funexperiments/quick/plastic.html>.
Weisman, Alan. "The World without us." St. Martin's Press (2007).
Wikipedia. Wikipedia.com. April 2010. April 2010 <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plastic>.
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