22 ms·

Stomach of Dead Whale Contained 'Nothing but Nonstop Plastic'

430 points by Ultramanoid 8y ago

BadassFractal 8y ago
Not sure much can be done here without global investment and adherence to never dumping plastics that are not biodegradable. The solution must be possible, but finding the will and the support to convince every country in the world to switch sounds incredibly tough. The US could flex its economic muscle here and say that it will not accept products from abroad unless they're packaged according to its new standards within the next 5 years. And of course adhere to the standards internally as well to take a global lead on this issue.
- viraptor 8y ago
  > global investment and adherence to never dumping plastics that are not biodegradable. Or not producing the unnecessary packaging in the first place. We really don't need every single cucumber wrapped in its own plastic film. (Like it's common in the shops recently...) Lots of other packaging is completely useless as well.
  - choeger 8y ago
    We may not strictly need it, but it is there for a reason. Be it less pesticides (my organic cucumbers come wrapped, the non-organic don't) or less waste (because damaged cucumbers are thrown away). The real question is, how does the plastic end up in the ocean? Bonus points for: can there be a biodegradable replacement?
    - ndnxhs 8y ago
      The plastic in the ocean is mainly fishing nets that are discarded there because its easier
  - lozenge 8y ago
    Those wrapped cucumbers last longer on the shelf and at home.
    - titzer 8y ago
      They don't spend much time on the shelf at the grocery store. They last longer in the supply chain, which means they can be shipped from farther, where it is even cheaper to produce. Make no mistake, the plastic wrap is there for one reason and one reason alone: to allow producers to make more fucking money.
    - viraptor 8y ago
      Take a canvas bag, wet it, put your vegetables in it, put the bag into the fridge - they'll last weeks. You can do this with a plastic wrap as well... but why?
- jogjayr 8y ago
  There's no such thing as "biodegradable" plastics. Plant-based plastics only biodegrade in commercial composting facilities. This is not something that's commonly known.
eecc 8y ago
Just like Climate Change, oceanic plastic pollution is a case of Tragedy of the commons. I can separate my waste and recycle as much as I want (and I do!) but it’s all useless if a random idiot proceeds to dump my weekly household recycling output into a river and call it a day. This is nothing that can be solved with personal initiative and responsibility; it requires international regulation and enforcement. There’s no other way
- wespiser_2018 8y ago
  I disagree. Tragedy of the Commons is a situation that is about the management of wildlife and natural resources for the purposes of maximizing yield, with the lesson being regulated consumption results in maximal natural harvest. Pollution is just a negative economic externality, or consequence of an action that is unseen by the participants, where more pollution is always worse. Unfortunately, no one owns the oceans, and the normal ways for resolving externalities don't work without an aggrieved property owner.
  - EB66 8y ago
    Your understanding of the tragedy of the commons is not accurate. Cases of pollution in public waters are typically prime examples of tragedies of the commons. Just because it's a "negative economic externality" does not mean that it is not a tragedy of the commons. Even the wiki page for tragedy of the commons lists "water pollution" as an example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons#Examples https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons#Example... Maximizing yield via regulation is usually the ECON101 lesson that accompanies discussions about the tragedy of the commons.
    - wespiser_2018 8y ago
      Still, I disagree, the mainstay of Tragedy of the Commons is about resource management through regulation, which does not apply well to oceans plastics. The "Water Pollution" example provided is about water management for the purposes of irrigation, and pollution of groundwater that needed for said irrigation. Ocean plastics could be different, if its just the systematic degradation of an ecosystem, orthogonal to resource management interests.
jl2718 8y ago
Third grade me believed that my recycling got recycled. But it didn’t. We paid extra taxes for corrupt deals to get it dumped in the ocean. That was my plastic that killed the whale. Why did they lie to me? I did always wonder where all the recycling plants were. Would it really have been worse if we had put it in the landfill?
- 01100011 8y ago
  Did your plastic really end up in the ocean? I'm guessing most of my plastic went to a landfill to be dealt with later or was shipped to a reprocessing facility. I understand your western guilt, but I'm guessing most of the plastic comes from places that aren't economically able to deal with their waste streams properly.
  - Ultramanoid 8y ago
    As already mentioned, many Western countries ( and others, like Japan ) shipped their plastic waste to China, until recently China refused to take it in anymore.
    - A2017U1 8y ago
      So you are claiming China paid money for recycling waste and then threw it straight in the ocean? Seems incredibly implausible.
      - chrisco255 8y ago
        Nah we paid China to "recycle" trash. And instead of actually recycling they just pocketed the money and dumped it.
        thereare5lights 8y ago
        That makes no sense. If they were doing that, why would they stop taking free money.
rudigergerm 8y ago
Isn't it going as intended Ballen whales have bad design, their filter mouth is used for filtering plankton out of the sea water, now they are vunerable to plastics.
benj111 8y ago
"According to the U.N. Environment Programme, some 9 million tons of plastic end up in the ocean each year. According to a 2017 study from the environmental group Ocean Conservancy, more than half of that waste comes from just five countries in East and Southeast Asia — China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam." Does anyone know how this fits in with plastic 'recycling'? These nations either were or are big importers of waste plastic. I don't really want to separate out my waste, only for it to be dumped in the ocean somewhere else.
- hrktb 8y ago
  We seem to be producing 8 billion tons [1], so 9 million ending up in the ocean is sadly predictable, even assuming earnest recycling efforts. [1]https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/07/plastic-produced-recycling-waste-ocean-trash-debris-environment/ https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/07/plastic-produced...
  - yardstick 8y ago
    More emphasis is needed on the Reduce and Reuse aspects of recycling. The ordering of the slogan is intentional: Reduce, Reuse, and only after those we should then Recycle. How can we better minimise the amount of plastic that is thrown out in the first place?
    - ndnxhs 8y ago
      I'd like to know this as well. The only solution I know is to buy everything at a local farmers market and make everything yourself which seems extremely impractical for most people. How for example do I not end up with waste shampoo bottles? Its not like I can reuse them because I don't have any way to get shampoo without another bottle.
      - CannisterFlux 8y ago
        I haven't tried this but you can buy shampoo in solid bars, like bars of soap, rather than in bottles.
hbarka 8y ago
Why hasn’t Amazon, Costco, or Walmart used their clout to effect a positive change? Have you seen all the plastic and unnecessary packaging in the goods they sell. The size of the packaging relative to the actual product is so ridiculous sometimes.
- BadassFractal 8y ago
  It would be great if businesses decided to differentiate themselves from their competition by using biodegradable, environmentally friendly packaging. I wouldn't mind shopping with them instead, even at a slightly higher cost, just so that I as a consumer don't feel like I'm killing our marine life for no good reason.
  - WalterBright 8y ago
    I would pay more to not get styrofoam peanuts. I once had a large garbage bag of them get caught by the wind and they blew all over the yard. It took a couple hours to pick them all up, as they'd dance away from my fingertips.
  - inapis 8y ago
    I found that it barely helps. You end up being In a minority of a minority. Low prices will trump environment friendliness or even convenience sometimes.
- titanix2 8y ago
  Did you read the article? It says that "more than half of that waste comes from just five countries in East and Southeast Asia — China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam". All the companies you listed are irrelevant there.
  - b3n 8y ago
    These countries import waste from many other countries, including the US.
    - 8y ago
jstewartmobile 8y ago
It wasn't that long ago that we used wax paper, cardboard, tin foil, and glass--and it all worked well enough! And with the glass, you didn't even have to worry about getting man-boobs or low sperm count from pseudoestrogens. Nothing more expensive than something too cheap, and it looks like the kids will have to settle the final bill.
- NeedMoreTea 8y ago
  Not only that it was all pretty easy to recycle and often reused. None of the countless types of plastic, and composite materials that can't be currently recycled.
NeedMoreTea 8y ago
I do wonder when humanity will change our ways to stop wrecking the only planet we have, while there's still a chance. First step is acknowledging plastic is a systemic problem that is rapidly becoming more trouble than it is worth. Then regulation to require degradable alternatives, re-use and dramatically reduce our consumption in the first place. Or do we just keep relying on the economic myth of infinite growth until collapse? Which, of course, doesn't even make sense economically.
- kirkules 8y ago
  Plastic is just an example. Greenhouse gases are another. The system in which it's a systemic problem already has and will continue to introduce other such problems. And it's more than just that "under capitalism there is no incentive to eliminate negative externalities", which is certainly true; without a way to avoid unaccountable concentrations of power, concentrated power will reinforce itself and find a way to cheat any system oriented toward the greater good. I'm not convinced it's possible in the long run to avoid the existence of these problems. Our best hope is faster and faster problem recognition, and magically broad solutions that work faster than the problems' deterioration.
  - NeedMoreTea 8y ago
    Agree with most of this. I don't want to though - I find it inherently depressing that we simply can't or won't do better. I want my kids to have a half decent life. We seem destined to keep right on trucking until we drive right off the cliff of collapse. I don't agree it has to be the way of capitalism though, it's a problem of unfettered capitalism. We have more than enough history to know. Post war we were happy to constrain and limit capitalism to give an unprecedented period of rising standards with rising regulation, services and low inequality. Neoliberalism broke it. Rowing back the excess power and politicisation of unions was one thing - removing them as a usable concept for two generations entirely another. If negative externalities can be ignored, then regulate until they can't, even if it has to be an entirely arbitrary tax on plastic, emissions or whatever. No country seems willing to go first, so we're stuck with the lowest common denominator of international agreements. Agreements where one or two derail any chance of global action and the rest won't get on without unanimity. Which starts to look insane.
cageface 8y ago
These stories rarely mention this for some reason but the bulk of the plastic junk in the ocean is discarded fishing nets, not consumer waste. Reducing the plastic waste you personally generate is still a good idea, of course, but if you really want to have an impact then stop eating fish. https://www.onegreenplanet.org/news/ocean-plastic-made-discarded-fishing-nets/ https://www.onegreenplanet.org/news/ocean-plastic-made-disca... https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2018/03/great-pacific-garbage-patch-plastics-environment/ https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2018/03/great-pacific-ga...
- cesis 8y ago
  Farmed fish is already more than 50% of market share https://qz.com/730794/the-future-is-here-people-are-now-eating-more-farmed-fish-than-wild-caught-fish/ https://qz.com/730794/the-future-is-here-people-are-now-eati...
  - jmngomes 8y ago
    Farmed fish spend their lives in overcrowded and filthy enclosures (too much fish defecating and feeding in the same cubic meters of water). Their feed is ridden with chemicals and antibiotics. It's the same issue as "normal" poultry vs "aviary" poultry. I personally prefer to eat less fish and meat than eating animals that are bred and raised in awful conditions that optimize for revenue; the quality of the output speaks for itself. - https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/farm-raised-fish-not-free-mercury-pcb-dioxin/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/farm-raised-fish-... - https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/apr/01/is-farming-salmon-bad-for-the-environment https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/apr/01/is-farmi... - https://www.peta.org/issues/animals-used-for-food/factory-farming/fish/aquafarming/ https://www.peta.org/issues/animals-used-for-food/factory-fa... - http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1663604,00.html http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1663604,0... - https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/sep/10/scottish-fish-farmers-parasite-pesticide https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/sep/10/scottish...
    - pvaldes 8y ago
honestoHeminway 8y ago
Imagine-this is how thermites started. Wood, undiggestable cellulosis in the tract.. and then one day. Fungi.
nukeop 8y ago
I eat McDonald's once or twice a month and I'm looked down upon for eating junk food, meanwhile a whale eats nothing but _literal_ junk and it makes the news and the whale is called a victim? Something doesn't add up here.
- inapis 8y ago
  You had a choice. The whale didn’t. Its also not that smart enough to reason about stuff. If someone forced you to eat plastic for the better part of a year, you’d be called a victim too.
- chronolitus 8y ago
  Is your point that you should be held to the same standards of reasoning ability than a whale?
verasio 8y ago
China. Indonesia. Philippines. Vietnam. Sri Lanka. This chart says it all: https://www.statista.com/chart/12211/the-countries-polluting-the-oceans-the-most/ https://www.statista.com/chart/12211/the-countries-polluting... They are everyone's oceans and these countries are disproportionately choking them with plastic. Blame must be focused on them for meaningful change to happen. I'm a foreigner living in one of these countries and it is shocking how absolutely careless and ignorant the majority of the population is with their plastic waste. Tons and tons of it. I see it every day. First hand. They view waterways as trash cans. Formal waste management is rare. Ask a local where to throw a plastic bottle and they are more than likely going to point to the ground.
- ASlave2Gravity 8y ago
  Doesn't China buy up a lot of US / EU plastic waste via recycling programmes? Are these numbers offset because once China buys the waste, they simply dump it? Are we knowingly selling our plastic waste to a state that will miss-manage it? I know China lately has stopped buying plastic waste from states.
  - theandrewbailey 8y ago
    China doesn't take plastic anymore. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/11/world/china-recyclables-ban.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/11/world/china-recyclables-b...
    - undersuit 8y ago
      The article that GP linked uses data from 2010. It might take longer than two years for the effect of China refusing the US's trash to actually make a change in media graphics.
  - swebs 8y ago
    You obviously have access to the internet. Feel free to look it up before posting instead of clogging the comments with things that might be true.
vfc1 8y ago
The problem is that micro-plastics are eaten by the fish and end up in our plate. It gets worse because pollutants in fish bioaccumulate a lot (fish eats smaller fish, gets eaten by larger fish etc.). Fish high in the food chain like salmon have a lot higher concentration of these pollutants, to the point that it's not even recommended food for pregnant women anymore. Farmed fish also creates bioaccumulation, because it gets fed other smaller fish, like sardines.
- notacoward 8y ago
  > The problem is that micro-plastics are eaten by the fish and end up in our plate. I think you meant to say that's a problem. There are others, even if that one looms largest for you.
gpmcadam 8y ago
This is a terrible thing for a creature to go through. How common are cases like this, or is this more of a one-off?
- notacoward 8y ago
  Not uncommon at all. Every organization that has anything to do with marine rescue (including pelagic or shore birds) has to deal with this kind of thing routinely.
  - gpmcadam 8y ago
    How often is 'routinely'? Can you provide a source?
- stevenwoo 8y ago
  There was an article on the front page recently where they found plastic particles in the cells of creatures in the Marianas Trench. It's plastic all the way down.
  - gpmcadam 8y ago
    How concentrated? Do you have a link to that article?
    - stevenwoo 8y ago
      Sorry I didn't see this when you posted but here are stories I found on the topic, the news doesn't cover concentration but does mention they found plastic in a higher percentage of samples versus earlier years surveys did not find nearly that much: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/02/deep-sea-creatures-mariana-trench-eat-plastic/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/02/deep-... source article: https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsos.180667 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsos.1806... I distinctly remember reading the researchers made sure their probes and sensors were plastic free somehow before they sampled the digestive systems.
jillesvangurp 8y ago
The attitude to recycling needs to change. Right now it is something you have to do or something that makes you feel good about yourself. But it is fundamentally still an optional thing and an afterthought. It's nice that that iphone is packaged nicely but that wasn't the reason you bought it. It needs to stop being optional and it needs to be something that is part of the product design process. Companies are not currently doing more than the bare minimum here because it is not their problem and mostly they do it to look good and there are a lot of companies for whom looking good is not much of a priority or for whom it is more about the looks than the reality. That needs to change. It needs to be their problem. Sustainable production processes are not sustainable unless they consider the whole product cycle from production to discarding. And the simple truth is that everything gets discarded eventually. Forcing companies to think about the post sales life of their products changes how they build their products. Planned obsolescence is a lot less lucrative if you have to clean up the obsolete mess you helped create. If they are forced to think about efficiently recycling used products they produced, the economics change. Durability becomes a topic. Repairability as well and facilitating recycling by using materials that are easy to recover and products that are easy to disassemble.
- protonfish 8y ago
  Recycling is the problem. It takes additional fossil fuels for transportation and processing to ship to across the ocean and be dumped in a river. Disposing of plastic waste in landfills is by far the best environmental option.
  - jillesvangurp 8y ago
    Not producing the plastic is a better solution. Making disposing of that plastic the producers problem is the way to get there. It will cause them to rethink whether they need that plastic and what type of plastic to use. When dumping in a landfill, bio-degradable becomes a nice feature. Landfills are already overflowing. Nobody likes living on a toxic waste dump. That's why the current madness of shipping waste halfway across the planet persists.
  - SupremeMeat 8y ago
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AngeloAnolin 8y ago
The discussion here was initially geared towards trying to reduce plastics but leaned more over the food that people eat. Just a causal way of observing how people tend to veer away from the point of the original issue needing to be resolved.
MayeulC 8y ago
I've been wondering how a fine on companies' products that are found in the wild could affect their behaviour. Of course, that means forcing (degradation-resistant) mandatory identification of anything at any point of the supply chain, but I feel like it would incentive companies to, at the very least, educate their customers and encourage them to cleanly get rid of their product. It could also shift them to more eco-friendly packaging, and I wouldn't be surprised if some companies decided to implement their own recycling ecosystem. Our government recently asked citizens to submit proposals on a few themes, so I ended up submitting that very one [1]. I am curious to see how it will go, or whether it will be considered at all. [1]: https://granddebat.fr/projects/la-transition-ecologique/collect/participez-a-la-recherche-collective-de-solutions-1/proposals/lute-contre-les-dechets-non-recyclables-rendre-les-entreprises-motrices-a-laide-de-penalites https://granddebat.fr/projects/la-transition-ecologique/coll...
swayvil 8y ago
We are the demons
seanwilson 8y ago
For people saying vegan diets might not be healthy it's trivial to find information online about this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vegan_nutrition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vegan_nutrition > The American Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics (formerly known as the American Dietetic Association), Dietitians of Canada and the British Dietetic Association[6] state that well-planned vegan diets can meet all human nutrient requirements and are appropriate for all stages of life, including during pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, and adolescence,[1] while the German Society for Nutrition does not recommend vegan diets for children, adolescents, or during pregnancy and breastfeeding.[7] The American Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics adds that well-planned vegan diets are also appropriate for older adults and athletes, and that vegan diets may reduce the risk of certain health conditions, such as cancer.[1] > Special attention may be necessary to ensure that a vegan diet will provide adequate amounts of vitamin B12, omega-3 fatty acids, vitamin D, calcium, iron, zinc, and iodine.[1][2] These nutrients may be available in plant foods, with the exception of vitamin B12, which can only be obtained from B12-fortified vegan foods or supplements. Iodine may also require supplementation, such as using iodized salt.[8] There's well-known athletes that are vegan as well: https://www.businessinsider.com/vegan-athletes-and-why-they-changed-their-diet-11?r=US&IR=T#fabian-delph-soccer-8 https://www.businessinsider.com/vegan-athletes-and-why-they-...
- lm28469 8y ago
  Our bodies evolved to make us omnivores, I don't see why we should restrain ourselves to such extent. What we need is moderation and sustainable means of production. This is clearly misaligned with our current lifestyles though. [0] In a few generations we went from "meat/fish is a once in a week delicacy" to "cheap meat at every single meal" (see the so called "meat lovers" thinking they're entitled to 2 pounds of bacon a day). Talk to your grandparents or great grandparents if they're still alive, they solved sustainability with low tech and no money, at the cost of convenience and comfort obviously, but you can't have your cake and eat it too. [0] https://www.nrdc.org/resources/wasted-how-america-losing-40-percent-its-food-farm-fork-landfill https://www.nrdc.org/resources/wasted-how-america-losing-40-...
  - seanwilson 8y ago
throw2016 8y ago
Another cynical thread derail on HN. The serious problems with plastics, out of control plastic use and waste is swiftly trivialized into an individualized 'consumer problem' and 'meat eating' problem ie let's not do anything. The first comment is splitting hairs about what kind of plastic waste with an irrelevant link to a story about plastic nets? This when the article clearly shows and mentions 40kg of plastic bags and there are thousands of articles and studies on the toxic impact of plastic on marine life. These kind of irresponsible comments are a serious problem as it makes readers feel we live in an uncaring world. Eat less fish? Only those who haven't thought about the world or those who profit from plastic respond in this cavalier fashion to serious global issues. Not a word about the packaging industry, regulating the use of better packing and nets, or the inability of consumers to make choices because race to the bottom leaves no effective alternatives. Instead lets dissipate responsibility, affect 'helplessness' and do nothing while the destruction of the planet continues unabated. This is a small minded ideology that puts the 'freedom' of a few to profit without constraints above all else.
jiveturkey 8y ago
If 1 whale can consume that much plastic, I have a great idea on how to cleanup the ocean!

430 points by Ultramanoid 8y ago

Not sure much can be done here without global investment and adherence to never dumping plastics that are not biodegradable. The solution must be possible, but finding the will and the support to convince every country in the world to switch sounds incredibly tough. The US could flex its economic muscle here and say that it will not accept products from abroad unless they're packaged according to its new standards within the next 5 years. And of course adhere to the standards internally as well to take a global lead on this issue.

viraptor 8y ago
> global investment and adherence to never dumping plastics that are not biodegradable. Or not producing the unnecessary packaging in the first place. We really don't need every single cucumber wrapped in its own plastic film. (Like it's common in the shops recently...) Lots of other packaging is completely useless as well.
- choeger 8y ago
  We may not strictly need it, but it is there for a reason. Be it less pesticides (my organic cucumbers come wrapped, the non-organic don't) or less waste (because damaged cucumbers are thrown away). The real question is, how does the plastic end up in the ocean? Bonus points for: can there be a biodegradable replacement?
  - ndnxhs 8y ago
    The plastic in the ocean is mainly fishing nets that are discarded there because its easier
- lozenge 8y ago
  Those wrapped cucumbers last longer on the shelf and at home.
  - titzer 8y ago
    They don't spend much time on the shelf at the grocery store. They last longer in the supply chain, which means they can be shipped from farther, where it is even cheaper to produce. Make no mistake, the plastic wrap is there for one reason and one reason alone: to allow producers to make more fucking money.
  - viraptor 8y ago
    Take a canvas bag, wet it, put your vegetables in it, put the bag into the fridge - they'll last weeks. You can do this with a plastic wrap as well... but why?
jogjayr 8y ago
There's no such thing as "biodegradable" plastics. Plant-based plastics only biodegrade in commercial composting facilities. This is not something that's commonly known.

eecc 8y ago

Just like Climate Change, oceanic plastic pollution is a case of Tragedy of the commons. I can separate my waste and recycle as much as I want (and I do!) but it’s all useless if a random idiot proceeds to dump my weekly household recycling output into a river and call it a day. This is nothing that can be solved with personal initiative and responsibility; it requires international regulation and enforcement. There’s no other way

wespiser_2018 8y ago
I disagree. Tragedy of the Commons is a situation that is about the management of wildlife and natural resources for the purposes of maximizing yield, with the lesson being regulated consumption results in maximal natural harvest. Pollution is just a negative economic externality, or consequence of an action that is unseen by the participants, where more pollution is always worse. Unfortunately, no one owns the oceans, and the normal ways for resolving externalities don't work without an aggrieved property owner.
- EB66 8y ago
  Your understanding of the tragedy of the commons is not accurate. Cases of pollution in public waters are typically prime examples of tragedies of the commons. Just because it's a "negative economic externality" does not mean that it is not a tragedy of the commons. Even the wiki page for tragedy of the commons lists "water pollution" as an example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons#Examples https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons#Example... Maximizing yield via regulation is usually the ECON101 lesson that accompanies discussions about the tragedy of the commons.
  - wespiser_2018 8y ago
    Still, I disagree, the mainstay of Tragedy of the Commons is about resource management through regulation, which does not apply well to oceans plastics. The "Water Pollution" example provided is about water management for the purposes of irrigation, and pollution of groundwater that needed for said irrigation. Ocean plastics could be different, if its just the systematic degradation of an ecosystem, orthogonal to resource management interests.

jl2718 8y ago

Third grade me believed that my recycling got recycled. But it didn’t. We paid extra taxes for corrupt deals to get it dumped in the ocean. That was my plastic that killed the whale. Why did they lie to me? I did always wonder where all the recycling plants were. Would it really have been worse if we had put it in the landfill?

01100011 8y ago
Did your plastic really end up in the ocean? I'm guessing most of my plastic went to a landfill to be dealt with later or was shipped to a reprocessing facility. I understand your western guilt, but I'm guessing most of the plastic comes from places that aren't economically able to deal with their waste streams properly.
- Ultramanoid 8y ago
  As already mentioned, many Western countries ( and others, like Japan ) shipped their plastic waste to China, until recently China refused to take it in anymore.
  - A2017U1 8y ago
    So you are claiming China paid money for recycling waste and then threw it straight in the ocean? Seems incredibly implausible.
    - chrisco255 8y ago
      Nah we paid China to "recycle" trash. And instead of actually recycling they just pocketed the money and dumped it.
      - thereare5lights 8y ago
        That makes no sense. If they were doing that, why would they stop taking free money.

rudigergerm 8y ago

Isn't it going as intended Ballen whales have bad design, their filter mouth is used for filtering plankton out of the sea water, now they are vunerable to plastics.

benj111 8y ago

"According to the U.N. Environment Programme, some 9 million tons of plastic end up in the ocean each year. According to a 2017 study from the environmental group Ocean Conservancy, more than half of that waste comes from just five countries in East and Southeast Asia — China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam." Does anyone know how this fits in with plastic 'recycling'? These nations either were or are big importers of waste plastic. I don't really want to separate out my waste, only for it to be dumped in the ocean somewhere else.

hrktb 8y ago
We seem to be producing 8 billion tons [1], so 9 million ending up in the ocean is sadly predictable, even assuming earnest recycling efforts. [1]https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/07/plastic-produced-recycling-waste-ocean-trash-debris-environment/ https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/07/plastic-produced...
- yardstick 8y ago
  More emphasis is needed on the Reduce and Reuse aspects of recycling. The ordering of the slogan is intentional: Reduce, Reuse, and only after those we should then Recycle. How can we better minimise the amount of plastic that is thrown out in the first place?
  - ndnxhs 8y ago
    I'd like to know this as well. The only solution I know is to buy everything at a local farmers market and make everything yourself which seems extremely impractical for most people. How for example do I not end up with waste shampoo bottles? Its not like I can reuse them because I don't have any way to get shampoo without another bottle.
    - CannisterFlux 8y ago
      I haven't tried this but you can buy shampoo in solid bars, like bars of soap, rather than in bottles.

hbarka 8y ago

Why hasn’t Amazon, Costco, or Walmart used their clout to effect a positive change? Have you seen all the plastic and unnecessary packaging in the goods they sell. The size of the packaging relative to the actual product is so ridiculous sometimes.

BadassFractal 8y ago
It would be great if businesses decided to differentiate themselves from their competition by using biodegradable, environmentally friendly packaging. I wouldn't mind shopping with them instead, even at a slightly higher cost, just so that I as a consumer don't feel like I'm killing our marine life for no good reason.
- WalterBright 8y ago
  I would pay more to not get styrofoam peanuts. I once had a large garbage bag of them get caught by the wind and they blew all over the yard. It took a couple hours to pick them all up, as they'd dance away from my fingertips.
- inapis 8y ago
  I found that it barely helps. You end up being In a minority of a minority. Low prices will trump environment friendliness or even convenience sometimes.
titanix2 8y ago
Did you read the article? It says that "more than half of that waste comes from just five countries in East and Southeast Asia — China, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam". All the companies you listed are irrelevant there.
- b3n 8y ago
  These countries import waste from many other countries, including the US.
  - 8y ago

jstewartmobile 8y ago

It wasn't that long ago that we used wax paper, cardboard, tin foil, and glass--and it all worked well enough! And with the glass, you didn't even have to worry about getting man-boobs or low sperm count from pseudoestrogens. Nothing more expensive than something too cheap, and it looks like the kids will have to settle the final bill.

NeedMoreTea 8y ago
Not only that it was all pretty easy to recycle and often reused. None of the countless types of plastic, and composite materials that can't be currently recycled.

NeedMoreTea 8y ago

I do wonder when humanity will change our ways to stop wrecking the only planet we have, while there's still a chance. First step is acknowledging plastic is a systemic problem that is rapidly becoming more trouble than it is worth. Then regulation to require degradable alternatives, re-use and dramatically reduce our consumption in the first place. Or do we just keep relying on the economic myth of infinite growth until collapse? Which, of course, doesn't even make sense economically.

kirkules 8y ago
Plastic is just an example. Greenhouse gases are another. The system in which it's a systemic problem already has and will continue to introduce other such problems. And it's more than just that "under capitalism there is no incentive to eliminate negative externalities", which is certainly true; without a way to avoid unaccountable concentrations of power, concentrated power will reinforce itself and find a way to cheat any system oriented toward the greater good. I'm not convinced it's possible in the long run to avoid the existence of these problems. Our best hope is faster and faster problem recognition, and magically broad solutions that work faster than the problems' deterioration.
- NeedMoreTea 8y ago
  Agree with most of this. I don't want to though - I find it inherently depressing that we simply can't or won't do better. I want my kids to have a half decent life. We seem destined to keep right on trucking until we drive right off the cliff of collapse. I don't agree it has to be the way of capitalism though, it's a problem of unfettered capitalism. We have more than enough history to know. Post war we were happy to constrain and limit capitalism to give an unprecedented period of rising standards with rising regulation, services and low inequality. Neoliberalism broke it. Rowing back the excess power and politicisation of unions was one thing - removing them as a usable concept for two generations entirely another. If negative externalities can be ignored, then regulate until they can't, even if it has to be an entirely arbitrary tax on plastic, emissions or whatever. No country seems willing to go first, so we're stuck with the lowest common denominator of international agreements. Agreements where one or two derail any chance of global action and the rest won't get on without unanimity. Which starts to look insane.

cageface 8y ago

These stories rarely mention this for some reason but the bulk of the plastic junk in the ocean is discarded fishing nets, not consumer waste. Reducing the plastic waste you personally generate is still a good idea, of course, but if you really want to have an impact then stop eating fish. https://www.onegreenplanet.org/news/ocean-plastic-made-discarded-fishing-nets/ https://www.onegreenplanet.org/news/ocean-plastic-made-disca... https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2018/03/great-pacific-garbage-patch-plastics-environment/ https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2018/03/great-pacific-ga...

cesis 8y ago
Farmed fish is already more than 50% of market share https://qz.com/730794/the-future-is-here-people-are-now-eating-more-farmed-fish-than-wild-caught-fish/ https://qz.com/730794/the-future-is-here-people-are-now-eati...
- jmngomes 8y ago
  Farmed fish spend their lives in overcrowded and filthy enclosures (too much fish defecating and feeding in the same cubic meters of water). Their feed is ridden with chemicals and antibiotics. It's the same issue as "normal" poultry vs "aviary" poultry. I personally prefer to eat less fish and meat than eating animals that are bred and raised in awful conditions that optimize for revenue; the quality of the output speaks for itself. - https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/farm-raised-fish-not-free-mercury-pcb-dioxin/ https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/farm-raised-fish-... - https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/apr/01/is-farming-salmon-bad-for-the-environment https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/apr/01/is-farmi... - https://www.peta.org/issues/animals-used-for-food/factory-farming/fish/aquafarming/ https://www.peta.org/issues/animals-used-for-food/factory-fa... - http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1663604,00.html http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1663604,0... - https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/sep/10/scottish-fish-farmers-parasite-pesticide https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/sep/10/scottish...
  - pvaldes 8y ago

honestoHeminway 8y ago

Imagine-this is how thermites started. Wood, undiggestable cellulosis in the tract.. and then one day. Fungi.

nukeop 8y ago

I eat McDonald's once or twice a month and I'm looked down upon for eating junk food, meanwhile a whale eats nothing but _literal_ junk and it makes the news and the whale is called a victim? Something doesn't add up here.

inapis 8y ago
You had a choice. The whale didn’t. Its also not that smart enough to reason about stuff. If someone forced you to eat plastic for the better part of a year, you’d be called a victim too.
chronolitus 8y ago
Is your point that you should be held to the same standards of reasoning ability than a whale?

verasio 8y ago

China. Indonesia. Philippines. Vietnam. Sri Lanka. This chart says it all: https://www.statista.com/chart/12211/the-countries-polluting-the-oceans-the-most/ https://www.statista.com/chart/12211/the-countries-polluting... They are everyone's oceans and these countries are disproportionately choking them with plastic. Blame must be focused on them for meaningful change to happen. I'm a foreigner living in one of these countries and it is shocking how absolutely careless and ignorant the majority of the population is with their plastic waste. Tons and tons of it. I see it every day. First hand. They view waterways as trash cans. Formal waste management is rare. Ask a local where to throw a plastic bottle and they are more than likely going to point to the ground.

ASlave2Gravity 8y ago
Doesn't China buy up a lot of US / EU plastic waste via recycling programmes? Are these numbers offset because once China buys the waste, they simply dump it? Are we knowingly selling our plastic waste to a state that will miss-manage it? I know China lately has stopped buying plastic waste from states.
- theandrewbailey 8y ago
  China doesn't take plastic anymore. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/11/world/china-recyclables-ban.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/11/world/china-recyclables-b...
  - undersuit 8y ago
    The article that GP linked uses data from 2010. It might take longer than two years for the effect of China refusing the US's trash to actually make a change in media graphics.
- swebs 8y ago
  You obviously have access to the internet. Feel free to look it up before posting instead of clogging the comments with things that might be true.

vfc1 8y ago

The problem is that micro-plastics are eaten by the fish and end up in our plate. It gets worse because pollutants in fish bioaccumulate a lot (fish eats smaller fish, gets eaten by larger fish etc.). Fish high in the food chain like salmon have a lot higher concentration of these pollutants, to the point that it's not even recommended food for pregnant women anymore. Farmed fish also creates bioaccumulation, because it gets fed other smaller fish, like sardines.

notacoward 8y ago
> The problem is that micro-plastics are eaten by the fish and end up in our plate. I think you meant to say that's a problem. There are others, even if that one looms largest for you.

gpmcadam 8y ago

This is a terrible thing for a creature to go through. How common are cases like this, or is this more of a one-off?

notacoward 8y ago
Not uncommon at all. Every organization that has anything to do with marine rescue (including pelagic or shore birds) has to deal with this kind of thing routinely.
- gpmcadam 8y ago
  How often is 'routinely'? Can you provide a source?
stevenwoo 8y ago
There was an article on the front page recently where they found plastic particles in the cells of creatures in the Marianas Trench. It's plastic all the way down.
- gpmcadam 8y ago
  How concentrated? Do you have a link to that article?
  - stevenwoo 8y ago
    Sorry I didn't see this when you posted but here are stories I found on the topic, the news doesn't cover concentration but does mention they found plastic in a higher percentage of samples versus earlier years surveys did not find nearly that much: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/02/deep-sea-creatures-mariana-trench-eat-plastic/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/02/deep-... source article: https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsos.180667 https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsos.1806... I distinctly remember reading the researchers made sure their probes and sensors were plastic free somehow before they sampled the digestive systems.

jillesvangurp 8y ago

The attitude to recycling needs to change. Right now it is something you have to do or something that makes you feel good about yourself. But it is fundamentally still an optional thing and an afterthought. It's nice that that iphone is packaged nicely but that wasn't the reason you bought it. It needs to stop being optional and it needs to be something that is part of the product design process. Companies are not currently doing more than the bare minimum here because it is not their problem and mostly they do it to look good and there are a lot of companies for whom looking good is not much of a priority or for whom it is more about the looks than the reality. That needs to change. It needs to be their problem. Sustainable production processes are not sustainable unless they consider the whole product cycle from production to discarding. And the simple truth is that everything gets discarded eventually. Forcing companies to think about the post sales life of their products changes how they build their products. Planned obsolescence is a lot less lucrative if you have to clean up the obsolete mess you helped create. If they are forced to think about efficiently recycling used products they produced, the economics change. Durability becomes a topic. Repairability as well and facilitating recycling by using materials that are easy to recover and products that are easy to disassemble.

protonfish 8y ago
Recycling is the problem. It takes additional fossil fuels for transportation and processing to ship to across the ocean and be dumped in a river. Disposing of plastic waste in landfills is by far the best environmental option.
- jillesvangurp 8y ago
  Not producing the plastic is a better solution. Making disposing of that plastic the producers problem is the way to get there. It will cause them to rethink whether they need that plastic and what type of plastic to use. When dumping in a landfill, bio-degradable becomes a nice feature. Landfills are already overflowing. Nobody likes living on a toxic waste dump. That's why the current madness of shipping waste halfway across the planet persists.
- SupremeMeat 8y ago

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AngeloAnolin 8y ago

The discussion here was initially geared towards trying to reduce plastics but leaned more over the food that people eat. Just a causal way of observing how people tend to veer away from the point of the original issue needing to be resolved.

MayeulC 8y ago

I've been wondering how a fine on companies' products that are found in the wild could affect their behaviour. Of course, that means forcing (degradation-resistant) mandatory identification of anything at any point of the supply chain, but I feel like it would incentive companies to, at the very least, educate their customers and encourage them to cleanly get rid of their product. It could also shift them to more eco-friendly packaging, and I wouldn't be surprised if some companies decided to implement their own recycling ecosystem. Our government recently asked citizens to submit proposals on a few themes, so I ended up submitting that very one [1]. I am curious to see how it will go, or whether it will be considered at all. [1]: https://granddebat.fr/projects/la-transition-ecologique/collect/participez-a-la-recherche-collective-de-solutions-1/proposals/lute-contre-les-dechets-non-recyclables-rendre-les-entreprises-motrices-a-laide-de-penalites https://granddebat.fr/projects/la-transition-ecologique/coll...

swayvil 8y ago

We are the demons

seanwilson 8y ago

For people saying vegan diets might not be healthy it's trivial to find information online about this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vegan_nutrition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vegan_nutrition > The American Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics (formerly known as the American Dietetic Association), Dietitians of Canada and the British Dietetic Association[6] state that well-planned vegan diets can meet all human nutrient requirements and are appropriate for all stages of life, including during pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, and adolescence,[1] while the German Society for Nutrition does not recommend vegan diets for children, adolescents, or during pregnancy and breastfeeding.[7] The American Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics adds that well-planned vegan diets are also appropriate for older adults and athletes, and that vegan diets may reduce the risk of certain health conditions, such as cancer.[1] > Special attention may be necessary to ensure that a vegan diet will provide adequate amounts of vitamin B12, omega-3 fatty acids, vitamin D, calcium, iron, zinc, and iodine.[1][2] These nutrients may be available in plant foods, with the exception of vitamin B12, which can only be obtained from B12-fortified vegan foods or supplements. Iodine may also require supplementation, such as using iodized salt.[8] There's well-known athletes that are vegan as well: https://www.businessinsider.com/vegan-athletes-and-why-they-changed-their-diet-11?r=US&IR=T#fabian-delph-soccer-8 https://www.businessinsider.com/vegan-athletes-and-why-they-...

lm28469 8y ago
Our bodies evolved to make us omnivores, I don't see why we should restrain ourselves to such extent. What we need is moderation and sustainable means of production. This is clearly misaligned with our current lifestyles though. [0] In a few generations we went from "meat/fish is a once in a week delicacy" to "cheap meat at every single meal" (see the so called "meat lovers" thinking they're entitled to 2 pounds of bacon a day). Talk to your grandparents or great grandparents if they're still alive, they solved sustainability with low tech and no money, at the cost of convenience and comfort obviously, but you can't have your cake and eat it too. [0] https://www.nrdc.org/resources/wasted-how-america-losing-40-percent-its-food-farm-fork-landfill https://www.nrdc.org/resources/wasted-how-america-losing-40-...
- seanwilson 8y ago

throw2016 8y ago

Another cynical thread derail on HN. The serious problems with plastics, out of control plastic use and waste is swiftly trivialized into an individualized 'consumer problem' and 'meat eating' problem ie let's not do anything. The first comment is splitting hairs about what kind of plastic waste with an irrelevant link to a story about plastic nets? This when the article clearly shows and mentions 40kg of plastic bags and there are thousands of articles and studies on the toxic impact of plastic on marine life. These kind of irresponsible comments are a serious problem as it makes readers feel we live in an uncaring world. Eat less fish? Only those who haven't thought about the world or those who profit from plastic respond in this cavalier fashion to serious global issues. Not a word about the packaging industry, regulating the use of better packing and nets, or the inability of consumers to make choices because race to the bottom leaves no effective alternatives. Instead lets dissipate responsibility, affect 'helplessness' and do nothing while the destruction of the planet continues unabated. This is a small minded ideology that puts the 'freedom' of a few to profit without constraints above all else.

jiveturkey 8y ago

If 1 whale can consume that much plastic, I have a great idea on how to cleanup the ocean!