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If 90% of the plastic comes from 10 rivers... wouldn't it make the most sense to build giant filters at the estuary of each river, and stop the plastic from rea
by ghostbrainalpha 8y ago
If 90% of the plastic comes from 10 rivers... wouldn't it make the most sense to build giant filters at the estuary of each river, and stop the plastic from reaching the Ocean with 10 giant recycling plants?
- skookumchuck 8y agoI'd also apply tariffs to those countries equal to the cost of cleaning up the plastic.
- icebraining 8y agoSounds like we need a "Falsehoods Programmers Believe About Rivers" :) Rivers pass through multiple countries. In my country, which is fairly narrow, many of the rivers that end up on our shores don't begin inside our territory, and we've had conflicts with our neighbors over the levels of pollution of the water entering the country.
- skookumchuck 8y agoRiver flows through n countries. Tariff each country (cost of cleanup)/n. Or apportion it by the number of miles the river flows through each country. It's not a terribly difficult concept.
- icebraining 8y agoNo, just quite unfair. What makes you think each country is responsible on similar parts for the total?
- skookumchuck 8y agoIf the country knows it is unfair, then they must have done an assay. If the assays exist, then the tariff cost can be apportioned fairly. I'm baffled why you think these sorts of accommodations are not what would routinely be done if such a tariff scheme were implemented.
- icebraining 8y agoSure they have done an analysis. Which no other country will accept. You're essentially asking to create some sort of river-pollution version of the IAEA, plus all the diplomatic costs that come with enforcing this. It's probably cheaper to just pay for the cleanup.
- skookumchuck 8y ago> Which no other country will accept. The whole idea of tariffs is you impose them on other countries without their assent.
- wuliwong 8y agoSomeone else pointed out that it might be hard to come up with an effective filter that also doesn't negatively impact the marine life.
- burke 8y agoPresumably a large fraction of the plastic would float at the surface. It would surprise me if some clever device to filter the top 1-2 feet of a large river couldn’t be built without impacting marine life too severely. Or maybe I’m wrong about a majority floating.
- severine 8y agohttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16916317 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16916317
- contingencies 8y agoThere's not a huge amount of marine life in some of those rivers. For others, like the Mekong, they are expansive delta regions rather than simple rivermouths which would prohibit the approach.
- Scaless 8y agoEvery single news organization has read the original study wrong or parroted another article about the 90% figure. The full quote from the study [1] is "the top-ten rivers with the highest loads contribute ~90% of the total river-driven plastic inputs into the sea." The top 10 rivers contribute 90% to RIVER-DRIVEN plastic input, not TOTAL input. It is still a large problem, but a vast amount of ocean trash is dumped by coastal cities in Asia. [1] https://www.ufz.de/export/data/2/149396_EGU_2017_Schmidt.pdf https://www.ufz.de/export/data/2/149396_EGU_2017_Schmidt.pdf