#ocean activist and studying to become a marine biologist

[arttsuka]

in the monster falls au mermando is a human and just named "mando"

multibear is also a human with 8 pet chow chows he takes everywhere with him

You're not fooling me into designing human multibear AND 8 chow chows.

You can have Mando

[solarpunkbusiness]

Italian company converts discarded fishing nets into chairs, car mats and Prada bags

Since 2009, Giulio Bonazzi, the son of a small textile producer in northern Italy, has been working on a solution: an efficient recycling process for nylon. As CEO and chairman of a company called Aquafil, Bonazzi is turning the fibers from fishing nets – and old carpets – into new threads for car mats, Adidas bikinis, environmentally friendly carpets and Prada bags.

For Bonazzi, shifting to recycled nylon was a question of survival for the family business. His parents founded a textile company in 1959 in a garage in Verona, Italy. Fifteen years later, they started Aquafil to produce nylon for making raincoats, an enterprise that led to factories on three continents. But before the turn of the century, cheap products from Asia flooded the market and destroyed Europe’s textile production. When Bonazzi had finished his business studies and prepared to take over the family company, he wondered how he could produce nylon, which is usually produced from petrochemicals, in a way that was both successful and ecologically sustainable.

The question led him on an intellectual journey as he read influential books by activists such as world-renowned marine biologist Sylvia Earle and got to know Michael Braungart, who helped develop the Cradle-to-Cradle ethos of a circular economy. But the challenges of applying these ideologies to his family business were steep. Although fishing nets have become a mainstay of environmental fashion ads—and giants like Dupont and BASF have made breakthroughs in recycling nylon—no one had been able to scale up these efforts.

For ten years, Bonazzi tinkered with ideas for a proprietary recycling process. “It’s incredibly difficult because these products are not made to be recycled,” Bonazzi says. One complication is the variety of materials used in older carpets. “They are made to be beautiful, to last, to be useful. We vastly underestimated the difficulty when we started.”

Soon it became clear to Bonazzi that he needed to change the entire production process. He found a way to disintegrate old fibers with heat and pull new strings from the discarded fishing nets and carpets. In 2022, his company Aquafil produced more than 45,000 tons of Econyl, which is 100% recycled nylon, from discarded waste.

More than half of Aquafil’s recyclate is from used goods. According to the company, the recycling saves 90 percent of the CO2 emissions compared to the production of conventional nylon. That amounts to saving 57,100 tons of CO2 equivalents for every 10,000 tons of Econyl produced.

Bonazzi collects fishing nets from all over the world, including Norway and Chile—which have the world’s largest salmon productions—in addition to the Mediterranean, Turkey, India, Japan, Thailand, the Philippines, Pakistan, and New Zealand. He counts the government leadership of Seychelles as his most recent client; the island has prohibited ships from throwing away their fishing nets, creating the demand for a reliable recycler. With nearly 3,000 employees, Aquafil operates almost 40 collection and production sites in a dozen countries, including four collection sites for old carpets in the U.S., located in California and Arizona.

[csnews]

Right whale once seen with calf at Sebastian Inlet has been killed in Canada

Jim Waymer - July 24, 2019

An endangered whale named "Clipper" that swam into the Sebastian Inlet three years ago with her calf was hit by a ship and killed in Canada. The North Atlantic right whale and her calf entered Sebastian Inlet in early February 2016, near the mouth of Indian River Lagoon, spending a day inside the inlet, swimming back and forth as amazed onlookers snapped photos.

The mother whale was about 45 feet long and the calf about 18 feet. Clipper got her name because part of her tail had been clipped off by a ship. She was one of eight North Atlantic right whales found dead since June  4 in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Canada. Five were found within an eight-day period.

"Wherever the food is, that's where they're going to go," said Julie Albert, coordinator of the North Atlantic Right Whale Conservation Program for the nonprofit Marine Resources Council. An examination found Clipper likely died from blunt trauma after being hit by a ship.

Several other right whales have died in Canadian waters this year after getting tangled in fishing gear. During the winter 2019 calving season in the southeast United States, right whales gave birth to seven calves, Albert said, following the previous winter of zero calves.

Four of the six right whale deaths in Canada in June were females, eliminating any chance of population growth for yet another year, Albert said. Humans are still the leading cause of right whale deaths, federal biologists said, even though the whales have not been hunted commercially for more than 80 years. The two main causes are entanglements in commercial fishing gear and vessel strikes, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Over the past two years, NOAA has documented elevated North Atlantic right whale deaths, primarily in Canada, prompting the agency to declared a formal investigation into the deaths it  called an "unusual mortality event."

A recent study by the nonprofit International Fund for Animal Welfare of 70 right whales deaths, between 2003 and 2018, found 43 of the deaths had a known cause. Almost 90% of those deaths were caused by human activities. The worst year on record for right whale deaths was 2017, Albert said, with 17 dead whales (12 in Canada) overshadowing five births that year.

Canada has local seasonal vessel speed limits and fisheries management strategies to protect whales, but some researchers and activists believe more needs to be done, such as mandatory speed restrictions and fisheries closures in larger areas, fishing gear modifications to include "ropeless" fishing, and coordinated gear marking to help determine where whales become entangled.

There are about 400 North Atlantic right whales remaining in the world, biologists said, with about 100 actively reproductive females. Some scientists predict those 100 females could all be dead in 20 years, putting the species at risk of extinction.

[myfuturebyalicia]

Why We Need Change - The Global Assessment 2019

Only a couple of days ago, the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) published a report warning humanity of the drastic consequences of global warming on ecosystems and diverse species worldwide. Written by over 145 different researchers originating from more than 50 countries, the #GlobalAssessment (with over 1,500 pages) highlighted devastating realities of climate change in regards to land use in agriculture, keystone species in ecosystems, marine biodiversity and much more. However what is arguably the most impactful declaration from the IPBES is that over 1 million species are at risk of extinction today.

The Main Issues

Agriculture With the rise of veganism and plant-based lifestyles, it should be clear that the propaganda towards the animal agriculture industry is exploding across the media. While many activists fight against animal cruelty and proclaim the health benefits of eliminating all animal products from one's diet, this UN report introduces a reality already explored in the 2014 documentary 'Cowspiracy'; animal agriculture is alarmingly harmful for the environment. Here are some key statistics mentioned in the report:

 - 300% more food production in comparison to 1970.  - Approximately 75% of freshwater utilised for animal usage or crop production.  - 5.6 gigaton of CO2 emissions originating from the animal agriculture industry, even more from methane (around 60% of ALL fossil fuel emissions).  - Over 33% of Earth's surface area used for crops and livestock, 2/3 of which used for animal grazing and 1/3 used for growing crops. (ibpes.org)

Marine Life A lot of people underestimate the importance of a functioning ecosystem within marine life in the ocean. Just because humans have only explored a fraction of the Earth's saltwater seas does not mean that there isn't a thriving ecosystem which is being interrupted by human intervention and overfishing. The following statistics play a large part of the overall report:

 - Only 7% of fish obtained sustainably.  - The UN predicts the extinction of 3-25% of marine biomass by 2100.  - 50% of global coral reefs destroyed since 1870. (un.org)

Pollution and Urbanisation The word 'Pollution' has been thrown around over the past decades nonchalantly; people usually assume that it refers to the carbon emissions originating from automobile exhausts and the plastic littering across the globe. The truth is, it's that and so much more, as thoroughly highlighted in the Global Assessment:

 - 100% increase in urbanisation in developed and developing nations.  - 5 trillion US dollars spent in overall costs for fossil fuel extraction.  - 0.7 degree increase in global temperatures since 1980.  - 5.25 trillion micro and macro pieces of plastic found within the ocean, 8 million of which ending up in our seas DAILY. (sas.org)

The report also touches on other topics such as the impact on our personal health, deforestation, climate change and indigenous peoples and much more.  Click on the sources below each group of statistics for more information.

What Will Happen to Our Ecosystems?

One thing which is important to understand when it comes to the overwhelming information mentioned in this report, is how it will actually impact life on Earth. If  you, the reader, are familiar with the concept of ecosystems, you will understand how vital it is that the biomass of each species remains in balance so that all animals can survive. In other words, if the population of one species decreases, so will the pollution of the species that consumes that one (as it's primary source of food will be eliminated). It is a concept often studied by biologists that is becoming incredibly important after the release of this report.

In order to fully demonstrate the necessity for ecosystems to survive on our planet, this example will hopefully clarify how ecosystems function: 

Example of an ecosystem:

Grass (Lots of it)

Eaten by rabbit (Not as many)

Eaten by fox (Even less)

Eaten by coyote (Just a couple)

Suppose that the amount of grass would deteriorate, many rabbits would die of starvation. This would result in less rabbits therefore foxes would lose their primary source of food. This would result in them dying of starvation as well. This would continue with coyotes until the entire ecosystem is disrupted and species populations may become extinct. This could and will most likely occur with ecosystems across the planet, as a consequence of habitats being destroyed and species being hunted to extinction.

What We Can Do to Help

Fortunately, along with enlightening all readers with valuable information regarding our planet and global warming, the Global Assessment also includes possible solutions to the issues occurring worldwide. "The Report also tells us that it is not too late to make a difference, but only if we start now at every level from local to global." states the Chair of IPBES, Sir Robert Watson. 

Change can only occur if individuals and corporations become educated about what is really going on around the world and right before our eyes. For this reason, the report has specified a plethora of resources, tips, short and long term solutions to hopefully stop harming our planet and save our future. The following are only of couple of the many resolutions the UN has suggested:

For Industries/Corporations:  - ecosystem based approach to fishing.  - promote natural collaboration within further urbanisation.  - encourage ethical and environmentally friendly animal agriculture sectors.  - invest in water projects which promote sustainability (for more info, visit un.org)

For Individuals:  - Use sustainable energy sources within your home (solar, wind, etc)  - Reduce consumption of animal products (mainly meat) as much as possible.  - Be conscious of the amount of water you use.  - Always recycle and avoid buying overly packaged foods/products.  - Evaluate your transportation methods. (there is so much more that you can do, just type it into your search engine and get started!)

I will end this article with a word about hope. Although the Global Assessment has left many people feeling hopeless and disheartened about our future, it is important to remember that the power to change the world is in our hands. We get to determine how our planet will end up by the choices we make, and even the smallest things can have the biggest impact on our overall future. Although we are being left behind with our elder's mistakes, it is up to us to prove to the world that we do care and will make a difference. 

Let us do something meaningful to save our world, and to save humanity. 

- Alicia

Important Vocabulary

IPBES = The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Service, established by the UN in 2012. It's purpose is to incorporate science and biology within governments in order to strengthen humanitarian and natural collaboration.

Global Assessment = A report commissioned by the UN and the IPBES highlighting the conditions of our planet's biology and ecosystems.

Cowspiracy = Documentary created in 2014 by Kip Anderson and Keegan Kuhn. Available on Netflix and many other streaming services.

[the-awkward-turt]

I love the nature and studying animals and their habits are one of my greatest joys. However I'm absolutely horrified of even considering studying to become a biologist. We treat our planet so badly and I don't think I could handle seeing it first hand, especially when it comes to the sea and it's wildlife. This makes me sad as marine biology is something I think I'd actually enjoy as a career, but I can't even buy fish for dinner without feeling like I'm responsible for the dying oceans... :(

You’re absolutely not alone in feeling like this. Here’s a favorite quote of mine from Aldo Leopold:

“One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds. Much of the damage inflicted on land is quite invisible to laymen. An ecologist must either harden his shell and make believe that the consequences of science are none of his business, or he must be the doctor who sees the marks of death in a community that believes itself well and does not want to be told otherwise.”

Compassion fatigue and burn out are very real issues for even the most passionate ecologists and conservationists. I myself have absolutely struggled with the overwhelming anguish and frustration of watching a world full of beautiful, complex, and vitally important living things slowly weaken and die while the rest of humanity seems not to care about the looming catastrophe.

And honestly I don’t have an answer for how to deal with those feelings. For me personally it helps to tell myself that even if we fail in the end, even if the world becomes an unlivable desert because we couldn’t get our crap together, working to forestall that demise is still a worthwhile way to spend my life. Every little piece is worth fighting for, and every scrap of progress matters.

I completely understand the feeling that the pursuit of a career path so enmeshed in this kind of sorrow and frustration might be too much for you. On the other hand, you do develop thicker skin to this sort of thing over time and there are plenty of biological pursuits that don’t involve regular interaction with the realities of ecological damage.

I would also warn you not to fall victim to activist’s guilt. Simply by existing as a human and living a normal life we are going to do things that hurt the planet even if we do our best to avoid it. But the reality is that most ecological damage is done by huge corporations that are mostly out of the average person’s control. We just have to keep doing our best to make responsible choices, put people in power who will protect our planet, and try not to get discouraged when we can’t do everything perfectly.

The fact that this upsets you so much as to dissuade you from a career path you would otherwise love tells me you care very deeply about these issues. To me that says you are exactly the kind of person we need in this fight. If biology is a field that holds a strong call for you I would encourage you to explore biological fields that involve less direct exposure to ecological damage and might be less emotionally taxing on you. 

But also, I get it. I really really do. I think you would be surprised at how many biologists struggle with exactly the same kind of feelings you’re talking about. I have sat alone in my car and cried over the natural treasures being lost, over fear for the future of this planet. Some days it is hard to care. But it is also some of the most important work in the world and it’s an honor to be involved in it.

[onsumocom]

Slashdot: Does America's First Commercial Offshore Wind Farm Portend a Clean Energy Revolution?

Does America's First Commercial Offshore Wind Farm Portend a Clean Energy Revolution? Published on September 21, 2019 at 12:34PM In the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Slashdot reader Dan Drollette describes visiting one of North America's biggest experiments in renewable energy, off the coast of Rhode Island. As the only commercial offshore wind farm in North America, Block Island is "setting the stage for what could be a rapid explosion in the number of commercial offshore windmills on the entire East Coast of the United States, assuming they leap the latest set of ever-changing legal hurdles set by fossil-fuel friendly regulators in Washington, DC." The goal of the Block Island test wind farm -- which started construction in the summer of 2015 and started generating some power in December 2016 -- is to see if it is technologically, environmentally, and scientifically possible to transfer offshore wind power technology from Europe to North America... This five-turbine, 30-megawatt endeavor has been effectively acting as a multi-year, real-world experiment in offshore wind power for the United States, paving the way for offshore wind farms on the northeast coast and the mid-Atlantic that could each be as much as 600 times the size of this test site, with hundreds of turbines generating electricity for hundreds of thousands of homes from just one full-scale, industrial-sized wind farm. There are more than a dozen large offshore "wind lease areas" suitable for wind farms currently up for bid from the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, stretching from Massachusetts to North Carolina. Massachusetts alone is soliciting contracts for 1,600 megawatts of offshore wind development (half have now been sold), which is more than 50 times the size of this pilot project off of Block Island.... Once it is built and running, the Massachusetts project off Martha's Vineyard alone will provide enough energy to power at least 230,000 households, or about a third of the state's residential energy demand. Other states are working on a similar gargantuan scale. All told, there are 28 offshore wind projects in the works on the East Coast, with a total capacity of 24 gigawatts, or 24,000 megawatts. To give a sense of the massive size of the generating power of the wind farms now in the works, the first commercial civilian nuclear reactor in the United States -- Massachusetts' Yankee Rowe Nuclear Power Station, now decommissioned -- generated just 185 megawatts at its peak. But after decades of false starts and tangled litigation, a sea change appears to be occurring for offshore wind in the United States, as this country races to catch up with Northern Europe, where this renewable energy source has become increasingly mainstream and increasingly cheap... And these offshore wind projects could have a big impact on the environment. The Union of Concerned Scientists estimates that the newly contracted wind farms would offset carbon emissions equivalent to removing about 270,000 cars from the road. They could play a key role in reducing the region's climate change footprint, while allowing the New England economy to grow... Consequently, this handful of windmills in one test plot have been closely watched, studied, and debated, from multiple points of view, by many different "stakeholders," as the parlance goes -- including Wall Street analysts, investment firms, engineers, economists, sociologists, fisheries experts, environmental activists, historic preservationists, ornithologists, marine mammal biologists, Native American tribes, scallopers, long-liners, oystermen, sport fisherman, real estate investors, the tourism industry, and homeowners. And, of course, lawyers. Many, many lawyers... The article notes that often windmill power companies "can piggyback on existing infrastructure, in the form of the high-tension power lines built for decommissioned nuclear plants or retired coal-fired plants such as the 1,500 megawatt Brayton Point Power Station on the mainland -- the last coal-burning plant in Massachusetts, which was shut down in May 2017..." After talking to several locals, he concludes that "If there is a common thread to the comments, it is that the windmills are quiet and distant, and that with a steady and predictable source of power, islanders no longer have to worry about blackouts or brownouts... If nothing else, wind had turned out to be more reliable than ferrying barrels of diesel fuel to a generator located on an island 13 miles out to sea."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

[toldnews-blog]

New Post has been published on https://toldnews.com/science/on-a-coastline-with-1200-dead-dolphins-fishermen-and-conservationists-clash/

On a Coastline With 1,200 Dead Dolphins, Fishermen and Conservationists Clash

LA ROCHELLE, France — At dawn on a recent Saturday, the crew of the fishing trawler L’Arlequin II pulled their cone-shaped net up from the Bay of Biscay, and found the usual catch crammed into the bottom: hundreds of bass.

And the bodies of two dead dolphins.

Such scenes have become far too common: A record 1,200 dolphins have washed up on France’s Atlantic coast since January, most of them with wounds suggesting that the mammals had died after being trapped in fishing nets.

For every carcass that ends up on a beach, several more decay at sea, wildlife biologists say, which suggests that as many as 6,000 of the 200,000 common dolphins living in the bay may have perished in less than four months because of fishing.

So a disturbing question hangs over the port cities that dot the coastline from Brittany to the Basque Country, and their hundreds of fishing vessels, with no clear answer.

Why are so many dolphins dying now?

Most people agree that fishing is responsible, but the consensus stops there. Fishermen claim that the unintentional captures, also known as bycatch, remain unusual, if not exceptional, while scientists warn that fishing vessels now represent a major threat to dolphins.

Activists from an environmental group, the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, have just completed a two-month effort to document the deaths and which vessels cause them.

“It’s an undocumented reality that has been unfolding far out to sea, and far from the public eye,” Justin Barbati, a 27-year-old volunteer with the group, said as he drove an inflatable boat closer to L’Arlequin II, where fishermen were dragging the dolphins’ bodies aboard.

That new presence leaves local fishermen feeling unfairly targeted.

“That Sea Shepherd fights against whale hunters in Japan, fine, but that they follow us while we are working and harass us, the small and decent fishermen, because some of us sometimes catch some dolphins? It’s out of proportion,” said Jean Lagarde, 75, known as La Rochelle’s oldest fisherman, as he cleaned black cuttlefish ink from his vessel on a recent afternoon.

The Bay of Biscay, the vast gulf west of France and north of Spain, has long been a haven for dolphins, brimming with shoals of sardines, herring and other fish that they eat.

Fishermen have historically cohabited with dolphins. Lately, they say, they have seen so many more that most of them don’t have to go back far in the photo libraries in their smartphone to play videos of dolphins swirling around their vessels.

Biologists at the government-funded Pelagis Observatory in La Rochelle first noticed a spike in dolphins washing up on beaches in 2017, when 1,200 of them were found dead on the French coast, followed by 900 more in 2018.

In the first four months of this year, the number already exceeds annual totals that were among the highest in 40 years, said Olivier Van Canneyt, who runs the observatory.

Autopsies carried out by Mr. Van Canneyt’s team have attributed 90 percent of dolphins’ deaths to fishing activities. They found that most had died of asphyxia, often with their stomachs full, indicating that they were feeding when they became trapped under water.

Many had abrasions or cuts inflicted by fishing nets, said Willy Dabin, who monitors dolphin strandings for the observatory.

“Some fishermen also damage the bodies quite badly so as to avoid damaging their nets,” he said in the institute’s cold storage room, showing a dead dolphin whose tail flukes had been cut off.

Because the common dolphin is a protected species, fishermen cannot bring the bodies ashore, so they throw the carcasses into the sea and most bycatch remains unseen, Mr. Dabin added.

Fishermen’s representatives argue that the number of vessels in the Bay, up to 600 in the winter and spring, hasn’t changed in recent years. The vessels are the same, too, and so are the amounts of fish they catch, according to Julien Lamothe, the head of a fishermen’s organization in La Rochelle.

“Every fisherman has had to deal with a bycatch, one day or another,” Mr. Lamothe said. “Those are shocking events that they are trying to avoid. Catching dolphins isn’t their job.”

But as a result of recent restrictions on catching sole, a bottom-dwelling fish, some fishing boats have been using higher nets to catch other species, which might have resulted in more dolphin bycatch, scientists say. Some have nets tens of kilometers long.

From porpoises in Mexico to dolphins in China’s Yangtze River, bycatch is “the greatest threat to marine mammals around the world,” according to the Marine Mammal Commission, a United States government agency. Most are long-lived species that breed slowly: The common dolphins of the Bay of Biscay become sexually mature at age 8 and can live up to 25 years, and females give birth every three years on average.

“The day our studies show that the dolphin population has dwindled in the bay, it will be too late,” Mr. Van Canneyt said.

Sea Shepherd’s activists, most of them volunteers, patrol the bay aboard the group’s own vessel, the MV Sam Simon, looking for fishing trawlers and dead dolphins. A New York Times reporter and a photographer joined them for a day.

“This campaign is about long-term observation; we are doing what the French government should be doing,” said Mr. Barbati, a biologist who assesses salmon stocks for the Canadian government.

Lamya Essemlali, head of the French branch of Sea Shepherd, has advocated for more independent observers and cameras aboard fishing vessels to prevent bycatch.

“Bycatch is the first threat to marine mammals, and fishermen cast their nets right in the middle of their natural habitat,” Ms. Essemlali said aboard the MV Sam Simon. “How can we call those accidental catch?”

The only long-term solution, she said, would be a ban in the area on fishing methods that indiscriminately scoop up whatever creatures are present. But that would threaten the livelihoods of hundreds of fishermen, and economies of their towns.

The French government has raised a possible short-term compromise.

The ecology minister, François de Rugy, said he would support research on acoustic devices that attach to fishing nets and make sounds that drive dolphins away. One study found that on vessels using the devices, bycatch has decreased by 65 percent.

But scientists and Ms. Essemlali object that the acoustic repellents, known as “pingers,” threaten to deny dolphins an important and usually safe habitat.

And they don’t always work; the trawler L’Arlequin II uses pingers. Two days before the vessel trapped the dolphins in its net, its captain, Charles Le Moyec, said that since he had started using the devices, he no longer caught dolphins.

“We don’t like it either when we kill dolphins, but so far the pingers have worked well,” he said in his cabin, as his crew unloaded dozens of cases of frozen hake on the dock at La Rochelle.

Two days later, two dead dolphins lay in his net, close to the acoustic repellents. Afterward, Mr. Le Moyec, 35, insisted that it was the first time he had caught a dolphin this year — adding that he felt harried by Sea Shepherd, whose volunteers had followed him around the bay for hours at a time.

Along the dozens of blue, yellow and red fishing cabins and garages in the port of La Rochelle, many fishermen echoed Mr. Le Moyec’s frustration, saying that Sea Shepherd wanted to treat fishing as a crime.

“We’ve never seen so many dolphins in the waters, and Sea Shepherd accuses us of being murderers,” said Mr. Lagarde. “What about the massive vessels from the Netherlands or Spain that empty our ocean far away in the bay?”

Those, too, have been on Sea Shepherd’s radar. As the group ended its campaign last month, Ms. Essemlali said it would be back in the bay next winter.

“In the Bay of Biscay, dolphins are predators and the fishing industry is turning them into prey,” she said. “We can discuss what needs to be done, but that must stop, period.”

[noaasanctuaries]

Celebrating Women's History Month in Sanctuaries: Pioneering Female Scientists

The Dr. Nancy Foster Scholarship provides support for independent graduate-level studies in oceanography, marine biology, or maritime archaeology, with a particular focus on women and minorities. Photo: Sarah Fangman/NOAA

It's a dark cold night in the early 1830s in Nantucket, Massachusetts. On one house's widow's walk, a father and daughter, bundled against the cold, are studying the night sky, stars, and seas, armed with telescope and sextant. When the whalers leave port next time, passing through what is now Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary, bound for distant waters in the Atlantic, Pacific, and Arctic, they will carry the navigational calculations that young Maria Mitchell has provided them.

Facing the social views of her time, Mitchell later wrote: "First, no woman should say, 'I am but a woman!' But a woman! What more can you ask to be?" She and other pioneering female scientists are the intellectual ancestors of thousands of American women today working in STEM fields: science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. In the National Marine Sanctuary System, about half of our sanctuary research coordinators are female, as are other members of our science team, working as socio-economists, marine archaeologists, and marine scientists to help achieve our conservation mission.

Dr. Jenni Stanley deploys a hydrophone in Gray's Reef National Marine Sanctuary. Photo: Alison Scott/NOAA

Nearly a century and a half after Mitchell taught astronomy to her female students at Vassar College, many young women enter STEM fields. Yet much work remains. There are over seven million STEM workers in the U.S.; more of them are women than ever before. Half of our working biological and environmental scientists are women, yet women lag behind in other sciences like engineering and computer science. Over 70,000 women employed in STEM fields serve the American people as part of the federal government, but that's only about 23% of 300,000 federal scientists, engineers, and technical experts.

Leading up to college, boys and girls enroll in and perform similarly well in math and science courses and exams. The first disparities appear at the university level and continue, at least for some science and engineering fields, into the professional world. Sociological research shows that bias plays a major role in preventing women from entering or hastening the departure of women from STEM fields. One fundamental solution to reducing the gender disparity in STEM fields is to address bias, through such ways as being aware of and addressing our personal biases, and undergoing anti-bias training and education.

High school students learn how to filter a core sample from Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary. At this age, boys and girls both enjoy and perform equally well in the sciences; the first great differences are seen at the university level and beyond. Photo: Claire Fackler/NOAA

Another solution is to encourage more girls to become and stay interested in the sciences. Effective strategies recommended by SciGirls include engaging girls in small collaborative groups; encouraging girls to use their creativity and think critically; and motivating girls with hands-on projects. Although the National Marine Sanctuary System's Ocean Guardian School Program wasn't designed specifically to address gender disparity in STEM education, it uses these kinds of approaches to engage elementary school students in ocean science and conservation.

Seaberry Nachbar, Ocean Guardian School program director, says, "The Ocean Guardian School Program provides the opportunity for girls and boys to apply real-world science to current issues that are impacting our ocean resources. In the process of doing this they are provided with the scientific knowledge, awareness, and confidence to make a difference in their future."  When women are encouraged and supported in STEM fields, they can make a lasting impact on our nation and our sciences. Maria Mitchell, for example, had an unusual amount of support and education as a girl and woman of her time, and she went on to be a respected astronomer, discoverer of a comet, college professor, and mentor to young female scientists.

Through initiatives like Students for Zero Waste Week, the Ocean Guardian School program provides the opportunity for girls and boys to apply real-world science to current issues that are impacting our ocean resources. Photo courtesy of NOAA

Mitchell also had the distinction of being the first professional woman hired by the federal government. She was hired to do astronomical observations for the U.S. Coast Survey, now part of NOAA. She paved the way for a number of other distinguished scientists, who happen to be women, at NOAA and its forebear agencies, among them marine zoologist Dr. Mary Jane Rathbun (U.S. Bureau of Fisheries, the forerunner to today's U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Service), coral expert Dr. Elizabeth Deichmann (U.S. Bureau of Fisheries), meteorologist June Bacon-Bercey (National Weather Service), author and activist Dr. Rachel Carson (U.S. Bureau of Fisheries), explorer Dr. Sylvia Earle (NOAA), Rear Admiral Evelyn Fields (NOAA Corps), and marine biologist Dr. Nancy Foster (NOAA).

Dr. Roger Airliner Young, shown here c1931, was the first African-American woman to earn her doctorate in zoology. She did her early work on marine organisms at the Woods Hole Marine Biological Laboratories. Photo courtesy of Woods Hole Marine Biological Laboratory under Creative Commons license

Dr. Easter Ellen Cupp, shown here at Scripps Institute of Oceanography, c1935, was the first American woman to receive a doctorate in oceanography. Her pioneering work Marine Plankton Diatoms of the West Coast of North America is still used in marine invertebrate work today. Photo courtesy of Special Collections and Archives, UC San Diego

Dr. Foster joined NOAA in 1977, served as the National Marine Sanctuary System's first permanent female director from 1983 to 1986, and eventually became the head of NOAA's National Ocean Service. When she died in 2000, she left behind an unmatched marine conservation bequest for the nation, a legacy that inspired the creation of a scholarship fund bearing her name. The Dr. Nancy Foster Scholarship Program, funded and overseen by the NOAA Office of National Marine Sanctuaries, provides support for independent graduate-level studies in oceanography, marine biology, or maritime archaeology (including all science, engineering, social science, and resource management of ocean and coastal areas), with a particular focus on women and minorities. Since its founding in 2000, the scholarship has supported 65 students, most of them women.

All of the Nancy Foster Scholars who have completed their education under the scholarship have gone on to professional science careers or to advanced education. Their research has covered everything from nutrient cycling in seagrass beds to coral reef erosion, and from seabird predatory behavior to dolphin population dynamics. The success of the scholarship program is a fitting tribute to both Dr. Foster's marine conservation achievements and her legacy of fostering diversity and connection.

Maria Mitchell wrote, “Resolved, in case of my outliving father and being in good health, to give my efforts to the intellectual culture of women.” Her legacy was bigger and brighter than even she could probably imagine. This month, we honor her and all the women scholars and scientists who pioneered the way for those of us who follow.

[asfeedin]

5 historical conservationists you should know

How well do you know some of history’s most influential environmental activists?

The conservation movement is hardly new. For hundreds of years, people have been advocating for the preservation and protection of the natural world. Some early activists educated the public on the consequences of deforestation. Others exposed humanity’s exploitation of natural resources for profit and encouraged the development of national parks. Still others revealed the dangers of chemical pesticides on animals. With activists spanning from 17th century England to 20th century America, here are five of the most important figures in the history of conservation.

1. John Evelyn

John Evelyn (1620-1706) was an English country gentleman who served on a variety of royal commissions and councils under King Charles II. Evelyn was a fan of gardening, designing his first garden at the age of 22. Over the course of his life, he authored about 30 books, including one of the most influential books on forestry in history: “Sylva, or a Discourse of Forest-trees, and the Propagation of Timber“.”Sylva” was the first comprehensive study of trees in the United Kingdom. It was presented as a paper to the Royal Society, a recently founded British national scientific society, in 1662 and published as a book in 1664. The book advocated for the replenishment of England’s forests, as industrialization and a recent Civil War had caused an increase in timber production, greatly depleting the nation’s woods. The book also provided detailed descriptions of the various types of trees in the United Kingdom, explaining how to cultivate them and cataloging their uses. Sylva was a best seller and encouraged wealthy aristocratic landowners to plant trees, eventually replenishing the depleted forests.

Keith Moore, the head librarian of the Royal Society, told BBC News:

Evelyn’s work in planting forest trees and harvesting the products from them – whether it was wood or apples – really hit the mark. Of course, you have to remember that this was after the Civil War so trees across the nation had been denuded as part of the war effort but, as Evelyn himself says in the book, as a result of industrial activities – such as glass making – people were chopping down trees, therefore they had to be replaced.

Ten editions of the book were published by 1825, and the text is now available online for free.

2. Henry David Thoreau

Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) was an American author and philosopher best known for his 1854 book “Walden; or, Life in the Woods.” The book described Thoreau’s experience living alone in the woods for over two years and is considered to be a masterpiece of nature writing.

At the time that the book was published, many of Thoreau’s contemporaries considered him an eccentric, and the book was not well received. Today, however, Walden is the most widely read 19th century non-fiction book and has been translated into numerous languages. The simple living and cooperation with nature that Thoreau described in Walden reflected his advocacy for preserving the wilderness. In his essay Walking, he proclaimed, “In Wildness is the preservation of the World,” arguing that people could not survive without nature. He also advocated for the federal ownership of woods and mountain ranges to protect them from commercial exploitation. The National Wildlife Federation (NWF) inducted Thoreau into their Conservation Hall of Fame in 1967, calling him a “conservation pioneer.”

3. Hugh Cleghorn

Hugh Cleghorn (1820-1895) was born in Madras, India to Scottish parents. He was first employed as an assistant surgeon by the East India Company at the Madras General Hospital. Cleghorn soon became fascinated by botany, and after studying plants and trees for several years, he began to give speeches about the failure of agriculture in India, catching the attention of the Indian administration. With the assistance of the administration, he helped establish the Madras Forest Department, today known as the Tamil Nadu Forest Department, India’s first forest conservation organization. He was appointed Conservator of Forests in 1856 and Joint Commissioner for Conservancy of Forests later in 1867.

Through his research in botany, Cleghorn realized that the British colonization of India had increased consumption of timber in the region, inevitably causing deforestation. He noted that the construction of new railroads by the British resulted in the consumption of an unsustainable amount of timber. He also exposed the colonizers’ cultivation processes as inefficient and dangerous to the environment. His teachings were instrumental in protecting India’s forests, and his findings encouraged the government to reform their timber cultivation methods. Among these reforms was the banning of “kumri,” a type of shifting cultivation that Cleghorn described as a “wasteful and barbarous system.”

Today, Cleghorn is known as the “father of scientific forestry in India.” His role in developing a program for forest conservation in the region was vital in protecting India’s natural resources from exploitation.

4. John Muir

John Muir (1838-1914) is debatably the most influential naturalist in American history. Often referred to as the “Father of Our National Park System,” Muir was an advocate for the protection and preservation of significant nature areas. He wrote articles about conservation for numerous magazines including The Century, in which he exposed the destruction of forests and meadows in the mountains. His writings influenced congress to create a number of national parks including Yosemite, Petrified Forest, Grand Canyon, Mount Rainier, and Sequoia.

Robert Underwood Johnson, an editor for The Century that had aided Muir in some of his environmental campaigns, suggested that he start an organization to protect the Sierra Nevada from degradation. In 1892, Muir founded the Sierra Club with a group of his supporters. The Club aimed to establish new national parks and to convince the government to better protect Yosemite. Today, the Sierra Club is the largest grassroots environmental organization in the world with over 2.4 million members.

Muir is also famous for his three-night camping trip with President Theodore Roosevelt in Yosemite in 1903. After reading Muir’s 1901 book, “Our National Parks“, Roosevelt decided to visit Muir in Yosemite, stating, “I want to drop politics absolutely for four days and just be out in the open with you.” During the trip, Muir convinced the president to expand the federal protection of the land in and around Yosemite National Park after exposing him to the exploitation of the valley’s resources and the degradation of the land. The trip forever shaped Roosevelt, who used what Muir taught him to improve his conservation programs.

5. Rachel Carson

Rachel Carson (1907-1964) was an American marine biologist and writer best known for her 1962 book, “Silent Spring,” which exposed the dangers of chemical pesticides, especially DDT. In her book, Carson argued that pesticide use posed a serious threat to the livelihood of fish and birds and could have hazardous effects on children. Her work encouraged the United States government to ban DDT, and Silent Spring is often regarded as a catalyst for the modern environmental movement and the development of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Before writing “Silent Spring,” Carson worked for the U.S. Bureau of Fisheries, later renamed the Fish and Wildlife Service, eventually becoming the Editor-In-Chief of all of their publications in 1949. She also wrote numerous articles on marine biology for newspapers and magazines and published three books about the ocean, “Under the Sea-Wind,” “The Sea Around Us,” and “The Edge of the Sea.”. Carson’s publications taught the public about the natural world, and many of them highlighted the ability of humans to alter nature. However, it was not until Carson became fascinated with the increased use of synthetic pesticides after World War II and published “Silent Spring” that she solidified her legacy as one of the most influential conservationists of all time.

Biographer Linda Lear perfectly summed up Carson’s legacy in her 1997 biography, Rachel Carson: Witness for Nature:

Her courage in sounding the alarm and her ecological vision of the oneness of all life indelibly shaped the contemporary environmental movement and anticipated the global crisis we face in the 21st century.

Updated April 21, 2020

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Tags: 5, conservationists, Historical

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[hudsonespie]

2020 Will Shape the Future of the Oceans

[By Fermín Koop]

“Our house is on fire,” said Swedish activist Greta Thunberg at the beginning of 2019. Her statement resonated throughout the year, with temperature records broken in many countries, an unusually intense wildfire season in the Amazon, and the ocean continuing to lose oxygen.

Millions took to the streets to vent their feelings at governments for not doing enough. In December, protesters inside the COP25 UN climate change conference in Madrid summed up a year of growing boldness, and frustration.

While society and many sectors of the economy will continue to take their own action to help protect the environment in 2020, there is still time to accelerate last year’s slow progress in the international arena, at landmark global summits on the oceans, biodiversity and climate change.

The global ocean

In June, a UN “high-level meeting” will be held in Lisbon, Portugal to advance the implementation of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) number 14 on life below water.

There is a total of 17 SDGS, designed to eradicate poverty, protect the planet and ensure prosperity.

Agreed by UN member countries in 2015, each objective has specific targets attached to it. Some of the SDG 14 targets are supposed to be met in 2020. These include putting an end to unsustainable fishing of all kinds; prohibiting fishing subsidies that encourage overfishing; and conserving at least 10% of coastal and marine areas.

“Several of the goals are far from being met,” said Loreley Picourt, director of politics and international affairs at the Ocean and Climate Platform. “In addition to evaluating them, we will begin to discuss the next ones by 2020. But we must see what is the point of doing it if many were not fulfilled.”

This second set of “high-level talks”, over which Portugal and Kenya will preside, will seek to elicit voluntary commitments to support SDG 14.

The ocean will also feature strongly in November’s COP26 climate conference. Despite it coming up well short, COP25’s final decision text did highlight the link between climate and ocean and agreed to begin a dialogue on the matter, starting with a meeting in June.

Countries are also expected to include specific mentions of the ocean in their new contributions to fighting the climate crisis, to be presented prior to COP26. Some, such as the South Pacific island nation of Tuvalu, have already taken the lead here.

“The COP26 presidency mentioned that it wants the oceans to remain on the agenda, suggesting that discussions on the links between the climate and ocean will continue,” said Rémi Parmentier, coordinator of Because the Ocean, an initiative joined by 30 countries to incorporate the ocean in climate change policy.

Overfishing

The World Trade Organisation (WTO) will hold its annual meeting in Kazakhstan in June. Among its various objectives will be the elimination of harmful fishing subsidies. The issue has been under discussion for more than two decades, but progress has been sorely lacking.

SDG 14, which will be the focus of the oceans conference in Portugal, includes among its goals the elimination of fisheries subsidies by 2020. The subsidies granted to the fishing industry amount to approximately US$35 billion annually, according to the Fisheries Committee of the European Parliament.

Fishing subsidies distort world fish markets and hit fish populations. But developing countries want to protect subsidies, which they say support low-income fishers.

Around 60% of the world’s studied fish are fully exploited and 30% are overexploited, according to the SOFIA 2016 report, published by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization.

“The WTO negotiations on subsidies have advanced too slowly and the WTO knows that. Action at the highest political level is needed. It is no longer enough to leave the discussions in the hands of technical negotiators,” Parmentier said.

Biodiversity

In October, Kunming in southwestern China will host the 15th COP to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), a crucial meeting to establish a new plan for biodiversity protection.

The conference has been called the “Paris Summit for biodiversity”, hoping to match the 2015 meeting that resulted in a global pact to tackle climate change.

In 2010, the 194 countries that form the CBD approved the Strategic Plan for Biological Diversity 2011-2020. Talks in Aichi, Japan, delivered 20 general objectives, known as the Aichi targets, to end biodiversity loss and restore ecosystems.

But most goals have not been met. China’s stewardship of the talks will look to preserve the Aichi targets as a minimum basis, and add new elements to ensure compliance.

“Biodiversity is experiencing a decline unprecedented in the history of mankind,” said Obdulio Menghi, a biologist and president of the Argentine Biodiversity Foundation. “It’s not just species of animals and plants, all ecosystems are being affected.”

Global populations of fish, birds, mammals, amphibians and reptiles decreased an average 60% between 1970 and 2014, the most recent year for which data is available, according to the WWF Living Planet Index. The decrease affects nature’s function to provide the world with fresh air, drinking water and other vital services.

There are five driving forces behind the decline in biodiversity, according to a major UN report published last year: changes in land and sea use; the direct exploitation of organisms; climate change; pollution; and invasive species.

“A transformative change is needed, according to IPBES. We cannot continue with the current production and consumption system. It is an emergency situation,” said Ana Di Pangracio, deputy executive director of the Argentine Environment and Natural Resources Foundation (FARN).

Climate change

In November, the city of Glasgow in Scotland will host the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26) on climate change. It faces huge challenges in resolving everything left over from previous years and spurring countries to be more ambitious in their efforts.

COP25 was meant to advance key points for the implementation of the Paris Agreement, such as the creation of an international carbon market and securing financing from developed countries to developing countries. However, it was a resounding failure with progress made only on a gender action plan.

“COP had clear mandates in Madrid but unfortunately it did not fulfil them. This year the original objective was to focus on achieving greater ambition. But now we will continue to drag out outstanding issues,” says Enrique Maurtua Konstantinidis, senior climate policy advisor for FARN.

Diplomats and other observers suggest the UK get to work on building support for the negotiations immediately, going from capital to capital as the French did in advance of the Paris summit. This could help generate preliminary agreements and create a more congenial environment in 2020 than the zero-sum game the talks have become.

Through the 2015 Paris Agreement, countries committed to limit global warming to 2C compared to pre-industrial levels. However, based on national contributions (known as NDCs) already submitted, the world is heading for rises of between 3 and 4C.

This year, countries are expected to update their NDCs, which should accelerate emissions reductions. However, only 80 countries representing 10% of global emissions have presented improvement plans.

Fermín Koop is an Argentine journalist, specialising in the environment with experience across diverse publications such as the Buenos Aires Herald, Clarín, Ámbito Financiero, Buena Salud and Notio Noticias.

The original version of this article was published on Dialogo Chino. It appears courtesy of China Dialogue Ocean and may be found in its English translation here. 

from Storage Containers https://www.maritime-executive.com/article/2020-will-shape-the-future-of-the-oceans via http://www.rssmix.com/

[jerrytackettca]

40 Kilos of Plastic Found in Guts of Whale

The food chain is an ordered series of organisms, each dependent on the previous as a source of food. In other words, herbivores eat plants to survive and carnivores eat herbivores and other carnivores. In the water, small fish eat plankton, and are then eaten by slightly larger fish, finally eaten by larger fish and then potentially ending up on your dinner plate.

Marine megafauna are large marine filter feeders that filter thousands of gallons of sea water to capture small plants and animals.1 These creatures play a critical role in the health of our oceans and the survival of all marine life. Sylvia Earle, marine biologist, author and explorer, believes,2 "The next 10 years may be more important than the last 10,000 in determining the fate of our oceans."

Plastic of all sizes is threatening marine life. Every minute, another truck load of plastic trash ends up in the ocean, amounting to 8 million tons every year.3 This plastic ends up in sea turtle and whale stomachs; it strangles seabirds; and is broken down into microplastics consumed by fish and plankton — with unknown consequences.

But considering the fact plastic will not degrade within a human lifetime, and many of the chemicals used in the production of plastic are known endocrine disruptors, the likelihood is the effect on human health may be greater than imagined.

Animal research4 has shown microplastics translocate into the circulatory system of marine animals, have a toxic effect on the liver in fish5 and affect the gut barrier and composition of gut microbiota in marine animals and mice.6

This data points to the importance of controlling the amount of plastic disposed of in waterways as it’s destroying our oceans. The recent discovery of a dead 1,100-pound Curvier’s beaked whale with over 88 pounds (40 kilos) of plastic in its stomach is an appalling and graphic indication of the damage human pollution is doing to the environment, wildlife and ultimately human survival.

Dead Whale Starved After Eating 8 Percent of Its Body Weight in Plastic

Marine biologist Darrell Blatchley was called to a fishing village in the Philippines to attend to a dead young Curiver’s beaked whale found floating off the southern island of Mindanao. The currents had washed away the blood the whale had vomited just before death and Blatchley knew, even before seeing the whale, how it had died.7

On examination, the whale’s ribs were protruding through its skin and it showed telltale signs of dehydration and emaciation. During necropsy (i.e., autopsy of the animal), Blatchley found more than 88 pounds of plastic waste in the young whale’s stomach, consisting of grocery bags, banana plantation sacks, rice sacks and garbage bags.8

Blatchley is the president and founder of the D’Bone Collector Museum, a natural museum and education center in the Philippines. Over the past 10 years the museum has recovered 57 whales and dolphins that died from consuming plastic garbage. He told The Washington Post:9

“I knew this whale had died due to plastic ingestion. I was not prepared for the amount of plastic. It was so bad the plastic was beginning calcification. The plastic had been there a long time. The stomach was trying to absorb it any way possible.”

This was the most plastic Blatchley had ever found in a whale. As a whale ingests plastic, it gives the animal of false sensation of being full. The whale stops eating. This leads to the animal becoming weak and either falling prey to predators or dying of malnutrition.10

Microparticles Found in Marine Animals Stranded in Britain

Researchers from the Plymouth Marine Laboratory and from the Centre for Ecology and Conservation in Exeter, U.K., sought to evaluate the extent of microplastic ingestion in marine animals using a large sample of 50 marine animals from 10 species stranded on the coast of Britain.11

Marine animals are important indicators of ecosystem health, particularly in relation to pollution, as these long-lived species have a high susceptibility to bioaccumulation of aquatic contaminants. The researchers wanted to determine the general number of microplastics ingested and the polymers involved.

They found the majority were fibers and the remaining 16 percent were microplastic fragments. The fiber particles were mainly blue and black, and nylon was the most prevalent polymer present. As marine megafauna filter-feed sea water each day for plankton, they're also ingesting tiny particles of plastic.

The study's lead author, Sarah Nelms, Ph.D. student researcher from the University of Exeter, found the results shocking but not surprising. Although the number of particles found in the digestive tract was relatively low in each animal, she commented:12

"We don't yet know what effects the microplastics, or the chemicals on and in them, might have on marine mammals. More research is needed to better understand the potential impacts on animal health."

The deaths were the result of a number of causes, but the animals that died of infectious diseases had a higher number of plastic particles in their bodies. Another study author from the Centre for Ecology and Conservation in Exeter, believes while it is impossible to draw firm conclusions from these results, ultimately, the findings are bad news:13

"We can't draw any firm conclusions on the potential biological significance of this observation. We are at the very early stages of understanding this ubiquitous pollutant. We now have a benchmark that future studies can be compared with. Marine mammals are ideal sentinels of our impacts on the marine environment, as they are generally long lived and many feed high up in the food chain. Our findings are not good news."

Majority of Microparticles Originate From Your Clothes

An unfortunate consequence of a large portion of innovations in manufacturing has been the impact on the environment, and ultimately on human life. Permutations and modifications occur at speeds far greater than safety testing may accommodate. One consequence of material transformation has been the development of plastic, which remains indefinitely as most do not biodegrade.14

A 14-person all-female crew of scientists, writers and activists manned a 72-foot vessel named the Sea Dragon to traverse the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.15 The crew collected samples to help scientists understand how plastics pickup other pollutants and transfer those through the food chain.

In one sample, the team counted more than 500 pieces of microplastic. This number extrapolates to half a million pieces in 1 square kilometer (a little over half a mile) of open sea. However, this does not account for nanoparticles showing up at the lab under the microscope. The team also found airborne microfibers, the result of washing clothes, which pose a risk to the human respiratory system.

Sarah Dudas, Ph.D., biologist with Fisheries and Oceans Canada, said out of the plastics they found, most of them were textile-based, or tiny filaments of fabric from clothing made from nylon and polyester.16 Unfortunately, much of this pollution is driven by “fast fashion,” which some estimate is the fifth most polluting industry in the world.17

The Ultimate Cost of Cheap Clothing

The cost of manufacturing clothing results in treating clothing as a single-use disposable item and creates a rapidly growing waste problem. In one study,18 commissioned by apparel maker Patagonia, data revealed the amount of microfiber released by synthetic jackets was dependent on the age of the clothing and whether the machine was a top or front loader.

The study found the amount released ranged between 1 gram and 7 grams depending on those factors.19 Wastewater treatment plants may filter out just a portion and the rest inevitably sneaks into the waterways and eventually into the ocean. Irregular shapes make it harder for marine life to excrete and contribute to physical blockages in their intestinal tract and chemical poisoning.

Another study20 led by the University of Barcelona quantified the presence of microfiber on marine floors from the Caribbean Sea to the Black Sea. They found the main types were natural cellulose (cotton and linen) and regenerated cellulose (rayon), while polyester was the most common synthetic fiber found.

Microfibers are also dumped into rivers and lakes. Sherri Mason, Ph.D., chemistry expert at State University of New York Fredonia, received the 23rd Heinz Award in the Public Policy category for her research and for raising awareness of the potential health impact of microplastics in freshwater, resulting in state, federal and international policy change.21

She has found microplastics are the most common type of debris in smaller bodies of water. Her concern extends to the ability of microfibers to absorb persistent organic pollutants and concentrate those in animal tissue.22

You May Be Consuming Plastic on a Daily Basis

The high amount of plastic production and waste has ultimately resulted in human consumption of microscopic plastic particles. One-third of the fish caught in the English Channel contain microbeads, as do 83 percent of the scampi sold in the U.K.23,24 Although the consequences are still largely unknown, it's highly unlikely consumption of plastic is harmless.

Plastic may not be thoroughly eliminated and cannot degrade inside your system. Many of the chemicals used are known endocrine disruptors, known to deregulate hormones and genetic expression,25 cause organ damage26 and have been linked to obesity,27 heart disease and cancer.28

According to a 2016 National Geographic report,29 an estimated 4,360 tons of microbeads were used in personal care products sold in the European Union in 2012, all of which got flushed down the drain. These microplastic pellets travel through wastewater treatment plants, clogging waterways and filling the bellies of sea animals.

With this much plastic debris in our ecosystem, and our homes, researchers find humans ingest plastic particles on a regular basis. A team of researchers30 were able to capture up to 14 pieces of plastic at the end of each meal by placing petri dishes with sticky dust traps next to dinner plates at dinner time.

The source was household dust. Researchers extrapolated the data,31 finding the average person swallows an estimated 68,415 plastic fibers every year just in the dust landing on their plates during a meal.

Microplastic Particles in Food, Drink and Stool Samples

In other testing, researchers found most bottled water contained microplastic pollution they believed originated from the manufacturing process.32 On average, each bottle of water contained 325 pieces of microplastic per liter. Only 17 bottles were free of microplastic particles, but none tested free of plastic contaminants. The worst offender was Nestle Pure Life, having the most contaminated sample at 10,390 particles per liter.33

In an effort to determine ocean density of microplastic pollution, a study34 evaluated salt brands sampled worldwide and correlated where plastic pollution was found in the environment. The highest quantities were in Indonesia, which ranks as suffering the second worst level of plastic pollution in the world.

The research indicates many of the salt brands tested contain plastic pollution; only three, originating from Taiwan, China and France, did not contain microplastic particles. While salt is a necessary ingredient in a healthy diet, it's important to choose the least contaminated product to reduce your exposure to microplastic pollution.

While scientists know we are consuming microplastic particles in our water, salt, food and dust, this fact was recently reconfirmed when researchers discovered microplastic particles in human stool samples.35 The samples were tested for the presence of 10 different type of plastics, nine of which were found.

On average, participants had 20 microplastic particles for every 10 grams of stool collected. Participants came from eight countries, and excreted particles measuring 50 micrometers (about the width of a strand of hair) to 500 micrometers.36

Become a Part of a Global Solution

Society has an affection for all things disposable, leaving a trail of death and destruction. You may be a part of a global solution by becoming a more conscious consumer and giving thought to the manufacturing of the products you buy. Each product also has an effect on you during use and on the environment after disposal.

Few are those who live a zero-waste lifestyle, but each of us may make definitive steps toward reducing plastic trash. Following are some of the most straightforward steps you may take to cut down on plastics usage in your life. Share them with a friend or two and the positive impacts will only continue to be magnified:

Avoid bottled water — Invest in a water filtration system and fill your own reusable glass bottles at home. Testing reveals many bottled water companies use tap water that may or may not have undergone additional filtration. With over 267 toxins found in public tap water, it's worth the investment to install a high-quality filter and bring your own water wherever you go.

Reduce your use of all things plastic — Here are a few ideas to get started:

Use reusable shopping bags for groceries and reusable cloth or mesh bags for fresh produce

Bring your own mug when purchasing coffee, and skip the lid and straw

Store foods in glass containers or Mason jars as opposed to plastic containers or bags

Take your own leftover container to restaurants

Request no plastic wrap on dry cleaning

Avoid disposable utensils and straws and buy foods in bulk when possible

Seek out nondisposable razors, washable feminine products for women, cloth diapers, handkerchiefs, rags instead of paper towels, and infant toys made of wood rather than plastic

Avoid processed foods (which are stored in plastic bags with chemicals). Buy fresh produce instead, and bring your own cloth or mesh produce bags

Avoid microfiber clothing and/or wash them as infrequently as possible — Select organic fabrics, refuse to participate in “fast fashion,” and buy clothing you truly need and will wear for a long time.

Stretchy fabrics and fleece items shed copious amounts of microscopic plastic fibers each time they're washed. Due to their tiny size, these microfibers37 flow straight through the wastewater treatment plant without being caught.

Up to 700,000 particles of microfibers leave your washing machine with every wash,38 and testing shows synthetic microfibers make up 85 percent of shoreline debris worldwide.39 Once in the water column, this plastic microdebris blocks sunlight required for plankton and algae to thrive, and the ramifications of which reverberates throughout the entire food chain.

The fibers pose a health hazard to sea life consuming them, and since they bioaccumulate, they act like sponges, soaking up and concentrating toxins found in the environment like PCBs, pesticides and oil, making the animal — which could end up on your plate — even more toxic than it normally would be.

Wash synthetic clothing as irregularly as possible using a mild detergent. Line dry instead of putting them in the dryer, as the heat and agitation will break down fibers. Handwashing or using the gentle cycle with cold water will also minimize the shedding of fibers, as will using a front loading washing machine.

Recycle what you can — Take care to recycle and repurpose products whenever possible, and/or participate in "plastic drives" for local schools, where cash is paid by the pound.

Remember recyclables must never be placed in a plastic bag, as recycling facilities will simply send bagged items to a landfill.40 So, to ensure your recyclables actually get recycled, make sure you place the items loose in your recycle bin.

For more do's and don'ts of recycling, see "Surprising Recycling Mistakes Most People Make." You may also check out this Lifehacker article for more information about what you can and cannot recycle in general, over and beyond plastic.41

from http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2019/04/10/plastic-found-in-guts-of-whale.aspx

source http://niapurenaturecom.weebly.com/blog/40-kilos-of-plastic-found-in-guts-of-whale

[csnews]

Heartache in the San Juan Islands: Locals grieve as resident orcas face extinction

Jamie Hale - September 14, 2018

The orca calf lived for only half an hour, but the mother spent 17 days carrying its body on her nose this summer, crossing the Salish Sea from the San Juan Islands into Canadian waters and back in a visceral display of animal grief that captivated whale watchers around the globe.

Tahlequah, also known as J35, was far from the first mother to grieve. Her population of southern resident orcas hasn’t seen a successful birth in three years. Over the last two decades, three-quarters of their calves have died.

Ken Balcomb, lead scientist at the Center for Whale Research on San Juan Island, said the three pods that make up the most iconic killer whale population in the Pacific Northwest have rebounded from loss before, but this time they seem to be headed in one direction.

“Extinction,” he said. “They’re not going to make it.”

Other populations of Pacific Northwest orcas – like the northern residents that live off the upper coast of Vancouver Island, and the transient killer whales that roam the ocean freely – are doing fine, Balcomb said. It’s only the southern residents that are in trouble.

The humans closest to the southern resident orcas consider them family, and already people are beginning to grieve. It’s a heartache that tears at the cultural fabric of the San Juan Islands, where residents’ lives are deeply intertwined with the creatures.

The problem is not only a dwindling food supply, but also the heavy pollution in the Puget Sound, where orcas have been feasting on salmon runs for tens of thousands of years. Orcas are apex predators, capable of hunting anything in the ocean, but the resident killer whales of the Pacific Northwest eat a diet that consists almost exclusively of chinook salmon – a food source that has steadily declined since the 1980s.

The recent struggles of the southern residents have garnered international headlines, and locals in the San Juan Islands hope it will lead to quick action by Washington Gov. Jay Inslee and his new task force dedicated to helping the three local pods. Marine researchers like Balcomb are calling for the breaching of four dams on the lower Snake River in southeast Washington, a plan that could provide the orcas with much-needed salmon. But the idea has already galvanized fierce opposition from lawmakers who argue the dams provide a crucial source of electricity, irrigation and recreation.

“Here we are stuck in the human paradigm, and [the orcas] are stuck in the human paradigm too,” Balcomb said. “There will be extinction with the current trends. We need to change the trends or just write them off.”

A ‘SLOW-MOVING EXTINCTION’

Jeff Friedman steered his boat around the edge of Patos Island, where tall black dorsal fins emerged from the water. The view was phenomenal – the Patos Island Lighthouse framed by Mount Baker – but all eyes were on the killer whales, which were busy feasting on an unlucky porpoise.

After sharing the meal, the orcas rounded the island and swam into the Strait of Georgia, where another small pod came to meet them. As the sun sank behind Vancouver Island, the orcas rolled over one another, slapped their tails on the water, and leapt from the water in unison.

Everybody on the boat was struck with awe, Friedman included. “It’s so emotional, spiritual – it’s deep, it’s a deep experience,” Friedman, captain and co-owner of Maya’s Legacy Whale Watching said. “Orcas are definitely my religion, and this is my temple.”

Friedman, however, recognized an important distinction: these orcas were hunting porpoise. That means they weren’t southern residents but transient killer whales, which eat other mammals instead of relying on salmon. They don’t call any one place home, but they’ve been coming to the San Juan Islands more often in recent years, and while tourists might not know the difference, to locals they’re not the same.

The humans who have inhabited the Salish Sea have always had a strong relationship with the local pods of orcas. But it wasn’t until the 1970s that anybody knew much about the ancient, mysterious creatures, and not until after people began killing and capturing them in large numbers.

As recently as the 1960s, fishermen shot at the predators with guns and harpoons, considering them pests and a public threat. But local aquarium owners in the ‘60s and ‘70s saw value in the animals, developing techniques to capture orcas and make them prime attractions at places like SeaWorld.

The public became enamored of the beautiful creatures, which boosted aquarium profits but also caused a backlash against methods used to obtain orcas. In 1975, after mounting pressure from both activists and lawmakers, the U.S. government allocated funds to research killer whale populations in the Pacific Northwest, with one big question in mind: How many orcas were left?

Ken Balcomb, fresh from a stint with the Navy, proposed a fresh idea: documenting the local orca population by photographing each animal’s “saddle patch,” a unique marking underneath the dorsal fin. The method was first developed by marine biologist Michael Bigg, and Balcomb put it to use.

Starting in April 1976, he spent the spring and summer following the southern resident orcas around the Salish Sea. He learned that the population was divided into three distinct pods – dubbed J, K and L – each with its own social structure and behaviors, like clans within a tribe. He also got an accurate count of their population: 71 animals, far fewer than anyone thought.

That same year, Washington state declared a moratorium on capturing orcas from state waters, and in 1982, his research helped convince the International Whaling Commission to enact a worldwide ban on commercial whaling.

With protections in place, the southern resident population rebounded, reaching a population of 98 in 1995. But since then, their numbers have steadily decreased alongside dwindling salmon runs and researchers remain skeptical they will bounce back again, headed for what Balcomb calls a “slow-moving extinction.”  

The youngest of the southern residents, a 3-year-old female called J50, was feared dead Thursday despite weeks of scientists’ efforts to help the emaciated, ailing calf. Her death would bring the population to 74, the lowest number since 1984. If calves continue to die for the next five years, Balcomb said, the population will become functionally extinct.

“You might have some living whales at the end of this century, but we’re likely to have no reproducing whales at the end of a decade,” Balcomb said.

Researchers like Balcomb have been coming to the islands for decades to study orcas. Most populations live in the open ocean, where it’s next to impossible to track them, but in the Salish Sea their behavior is more predictable – they follow the salmon. That fact has forged an unusually strong bond between the ocean predators and the humans with whom they share the sea.

“They are the charismatic megafauna of the marine environment around here. They absolutely captivate you to watch them,” Balcomb said. “You’re in the presence of something that’s obviously bigger than you and maybe spiritually beyond us too – socially they are. They’re pretty awesome.”

It’s hard to overstate how important these particular orcas are to the San Juan Islands. Locals have become accustomed to regular sightings in spring and summer, both onshore and in the water, where the animals nuzzle the underside of their boats and swim up to their kayaks. In Friday Harbor, killer whales are depicted on murals, emblazoned on signs, sold on T-shirts, bags of coffee and in the form of plush toys.

Becki Day, executive director of the San Juan Island Chamber of Commerce, said the most common question the visitors center receives (after “where are the bathrooms?”) is “where can I see the whales?” She said the extinction of the resident orcas would definitely affect local businesses.

“The community loves them, they really do. Everybody loves them. We want them to survive and not just for the business part,” she said.

For Friedman, who runs about 250 whale watching trips every year, the loss carries more of an emotional impact than economic. Because even if the southern residents go extinct, there might still be orcas in the Salish Sea.

AGE OF THE TRANSIENTS

Lack of salmon may be forcing local orcas to go off in search of food, but the plentiful supply of seals and porpoise have been attracting more transient orcas to the San Juan Islands.

According to researchers, the presence of the transient orcas won’t help or hurt the southern residents. The two populations are considered subspecies that speak different dialects and generally don’t interact. If anything, the absence of the southern residents might allow the intruding transients more freedom to hunt around the islands.

To tourists, an orca is an orca, but for locals it’s not that simple.

“As interesting as they are, and as much as we connect with them as well, the identity of Friday Harbor and this region was built on southern residents. You can’t just swap out one population for another and say nothing’s changed,” Friedman said.

Balcomb agrees. When you go out on a boat, “you’re hoping to see a southern resident,” he said. The southern residents are easy for experienced whale watchers to identify, distinguished by their behavior, social structures and saddle patches, which researchers like Balcomb have long since learned by heart.

The transients, on the other hand, are strangers. Many have been identified, but nobody knows when they’ll come and go or how long they’ll stick around. The people who live in the San Juan Islands are used to the regularity and familiarity of their neighborhood orcas, the animals they’ve lived with for decades, through baby booms and, for the foreseeable future, tragic deaths.

“They are the most family-oriented animals I have ever seen – everything is about family,” Friedman said. For him, losing the local orcas is like losing members of his own family. “You can’t help but break down in tears knowing what’s going on and knowing how difficult it is for these animals.”

For San Juan Island native Gordy Petersen, 65, it’s all made for a strange few decades. In the 1950s and ‘60s, fishermen didn’t think twice about shooting at orcas, he said. But by the ‘80s, locals were organizing whale watching tours just to see them. Now, there’s talk of the resident orcas being gone completely.

When he was a teenager he witnessed a capture in a nearby bay, watching from a boat as captors worked to wrangle an orca.

“I didn’t like that. It was fascinating, but it was sort of disturbing at the same time,” he said.

Now the owner of a building in downtown Friday Harbor, Petersen still has mixed feelings about the struggle of the southern residents. It would be sad to see them go extinct, he said, but nature will fill the void somehow.

Transient orcas will still probably come, whale watching boats will still go out, and businesses in Friday Harbor will hum along, telling tourists the sad story of the orcas that once called this place home.

“Friday Harbor has been here before the whale craze and it’ll be here after,” Petersen said. “People come here because it’s a beautiful place and that’s not going to change.”

WHERE TO SEE ORCAS IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST

Washington

Your best bet to see killer whales anywhere is on a whale watching boat in the San Juan Islands in Washington. Most tour companies are based in Friday Harbor, but Anacortes has some as well. You’ll likely see southern resident and transient orcas, but you might also see humpback whales, gray whales and porpoises. Oregon

Orca sightings are rarer on the Oregon coast, but they do happen regularly. The southern residents are known to occasionally feast on salmon runs at the mouth of the Columbia River, but you’ll need some luck to see them. The same goes for transients, which show up unannounced to feed on sea lions and seals. Canada

If your passport is current, you can cross the border and find orcas around Vancouver Island, which has whale watching outfits based in Victoria, Sidney and towns along both coasts. On the north side of the island, you can see the northern resident orcas, which feed along the Johnstone Strait in summer and fall.  

[paullassiterca]

40 Kilos of Plastic Found in Guts of Whale

The food chain is an ordered series of organisms, each dependent on the previous as a source of food. In other words, herbivores eat plants to survive and carnivores eat herbivores and other carnivores. In the water, small fish eat plankton, and are then eaten by slightly larger fish, finally eaten by larger fish and then potentially ending up on your dinner plate.

Marine megafauna are large marine filter feeders that filter thousands of gallons of sea water to capture small plants and animals.1 These creatures play a critical role in the health of our oceans and the survival of all marine life. Sylvia Earle, marine biologist, author and explorer, believes,2 “The next 10 years may be more important than the last 10,000 in determining the fate of our oceans.”

Plastic of all sizes is threatening marine life. Every minute, another truck load of plastic trash ends up in the ocean, amounting to 8 million tons every year.3 This plastic ends up in sea turtle and whale stomachs; it strangles seabirds; and is broken down into microplastics consumed by fish and plankton — with unknown consequences.

But considering the fact plastic will not degrade within a human lifetime, and many of the chemicals used in the production of plastic are known endocrine disruptors, the likelihood is the effect on human health may be greater than imagined.

Animal research4 has shown microplastics translocate into the circulatory system of marine animals, have a toxic effect on the liver in fish5 and affect the gut barrier and composition of gut microbiota in marine animals and mice.6

This data points to the importance of controlling the amount of plastic disposed of in waterways as it’s destroying our oceans. The recent discovery of a dead 1,100-pound Curvier’s beaked whale with over 88 pounds (40 kilos) of plastic in its stomach is an appalling and graphic indication of the damage human pollution is doing to the environment, wildlife and ultimately human survival.

Dead Whale Starved After Eating 8 Percent of Its Body Weight in Plastic

Marine biologist Darrell Blatchley was called to a fishing village in the Philippines to attend to a dead young Curiver’s beaked whale found floating off the southern island of Mindanao. The currents had washed away the blood the whale had vomited just before death and Blatchley knew, even before seeing the whale, how it had died.7

On examination, the whale’s ribs were protruding through its skin and it showed telltale signs of dehydration and emaciation. During necropsy (i.e., autopsy of the animal), Blatchley found more than 88 pounds of plastic waste in the young whale’s stomach, consisting of grocery bags, banana plantation sacks, rice sacks and garbage bags.8

Blatchley is the president and founder of the D’Bone Collector Museum, a natural museum and education center in the Philippines. Over the past 10 years the museum has recovered 57 whales and dolphins that died from consuming plastic garbage. He told The Washington Post:9

“I knew this whale had died due to plastic ingestion. I was not prepared for the amount of plastic. It was so bad the plastic was beginning calcification. The plastic had been there a long time. The stomach was trying to absorb it any way possible.”

This was the most plastic Blatchley had ever found in a whale. As a whale ingests plastic, it gives the animal of false sensation of being full. The whale stops eating. This leads to the animal becoming weak and either falling prey to predators or dying of malnutrition.10

Microparticles Found in Marine Animals Stranded in Britain

Researchers from the Plymouth Marine Laboratory and from the Centre for Ecology and Conservation in Exeter, U.K., sought to evaluate the extent of microplastic ingestion in marine animals using a large sample of 50 marine animals from 10 species stranded on the coast of Britain.11

Marine animals are important indicators of ecosystem health, particularly in relation to pollution, as these long-lived species have a high susceptibility to bioaccumulation of aquatic contaminants. The researchers wanted to determine the general number of microplastics ingested and the polymers involved.

They found the majority were fibers and the remaining 16 percent were microplastic fragments. The fiber particles were mainly blue and black, and nylon was the most prevalent polymer present. As marine megafauna filter-feed sea water each day for plankton, they’re also ingesting tiny particles of plastic.

The study’s lead author, Sarah Nelms, Ph.D. student researcher from the University of Exeter, found the results shocking but not surprising. Although the number of particles found in the digestive tract was relatively low in each animal, she commented:12

“We don’t yet know what effects the microplastics, or the chemicals on and in them, might have on marine mammals. More research is needed to better understand the potential impacts on animal health.”

The deaths were the result of a number of causes, but the animals that died of infectious diseases had a higher number of plastic particles in their bodies. Another study author from the Centre for Ecology and Conservation in Exeter, believes while it is impossible to draw firm conclusions from these results, ultimately, the findings are bad news:13

“We can’t draw any firm conclusions on the potential biological significance of this observation. We are at the very early stages of understanding this ubiquitous pollutant. We now have a benchmark that future studies can be compared with. Marine mammals are ideal sentinels of our impacts on the marine environment, as they are generally long lived and many feed high up in the food chain. Our findings are not good news.”

Majority of Microparticles Originate From Your Clothes

An unfortunate consequence of a large portion of innovations in manufacturing has been the impact on the environment, and ultimately on human life. Permutations and modifications occur at speeds far greater than safety testing may accommodate. One consequence of material transformation has been the development of plastic, which remains indefinitely as most do not biodegrade.14

A 14-person all-female crew of scientists, writers and activists manned a 72-foot vessel named the Sea Dragon to traverse the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.15 The crew collected samples to help scientists understand how plastics pickup other pollutants and transfer those through the food chain.

In one sample, the team counted more than 500 pieces of microplastic. This number extrapolates to half a million pieces in 1 square kilometer (a little over half a mile) of open sea. However, this does not account for nanoparticles showing up at the lab under the microscope. The team also found airborne microfibers, the result of washing clothes, which pose a risk to the human respiratory system.

Sarah Dudas, Ph.D., biologist with Fisheries and Oceans Canada, said out of the plastics they found, most of them were textile-based, or tiny filaments of fabric from clothing made from nylon and polyester.16 Unfortunately, much of this pollution is driven by “fast fashion,” which some estimate is the fifth most polluting industry in the world.17

The Ultimate Cost of Cheap Clothing

The cost of manufacturing clothing results in treating clothing as a single-use disposable item and creates a rapidly growing waste problem. In one study,18 commissioned by apparel maker Patagonia, data revealed the amount of microfiber released by synthetic jackets was dependent on the age of the clothing and whether the machine was a top or front loader.

The study found the amount released ranged between 1 gram and 7 grams depending on those factors.19 Wastewater treatment plants may filter out just a portion and the rest inevitably sneaks into the waterways and eventually into the ocean. Irregular shapes make it harder for marine life to excrete and contribute to physical blockages in their intestinal tract and chemical poisoning.

Another study20 led by the University of Barcelona quantified the presence of microfiber on marine floors from the Caribbean Sea to the Black Sea. They found the main types were natural cellulose (cotton and linen) and regenerated cellulose (rayon), while polyester was the most common synthetic fiber found.

Microfibers are also dumped into rivers and lakes. Sherri Mason, Ph.D., chemistry expert at State University of New York Fredonia, received the 23rd Heinz Award in the Public Policy category for her research and for raising awareness of the potential health impact of microplastics in freshwater, resulting in state, federal and international policy change.21

She has found microplastics are the most common type of debris in smaller bodies of water. Her concern extends to the ability of microfibers to absorb persistent organic pollutants and concentrate those in animal tissue.22

You May Be Consuming Plastic on a Daily Basis

The high amount of plastic production and waste has ultimately resulted in human consumption of microscopic plastic particles. One-third of the fish caught in the English Channel contain microbeads, as do 83 percent of the scampi sold in the U.K.23,24 Although the consequences are still largely unknown, it’s highly unlikely consumption of plastic is harmless.

Plastic may not be thoroughly eliminated and cannot degrade inside your system. Many of the chemicals used are known endocrine disruptors, known to deregulate hormones and genetic expression,25 cause organ damage26 and have been linked to obesity,27heart disease and cancer.28

According to a 2016 National Geographic report,29 an estimated 4,360 tons of microbeads were used in personal care products sold in the European Union in 2012, all of which got flushed down the drain. These microplastic pellets travel through wastewater treatment plants, clogging waterways and filling the bellies of sea animals.

With this much plastic debris in our ecosystem, and our homes, researchers find humans ingest plastic particles on a regular basis. A team of researchers30 were able to capture up to 14 pieces of plastic at the end of each meal by placing petri dishes with sticky dust traps next to dinner plates at dinner time.

The source was household dust. Researchers extrapolated the data,31 finding the average person swallows an estimated 68,415 plastic fibers every year just in the dust landing on their plates during a meal.

Microplastic Particles in Food, Drink and Stool Samples

In other testing, researchers found most bottled water contained microplastic pollution they believed originated from the manufacturing process.32 On average, each bottle of water contained 325 pieces of microplastic per liter. Only 17 bottles were free of microplastic particles, but none tested free of plastic contaminants. The worst offender was Nestle Pure Life, having the most contaminated sample at 10,390 particles per liter.33

In an effort to determine ocean density of microplastic pollution, a study34 evaluated salt brands sampled worldwide and correlated where plastic pollution was found in the environment. The highest quantities were in Indonesia, which ranks as suffering the second worst level of plastic pollution in the world.

The research indicates many of the salt brands tested contain plastic pollution; only three, originating from Taiwan, China and France, did not contain microplastic particles. While salt is a necessary ingredient in a healthy diet, it’s important to choose the least contaminated product to reduce your exposure to microplastic pollution.

While scientists know we are consuming microplastic particles in our water, salt, food and dust, this fact was recently reconfirmed when researchers discovered microplastic particles in human stool samples.35 The samples were tested for the presence of 10 different type of plastics, nine of which were found.

On average, participants had 20 microplastic particles for every 10 grams of stool collected. Participants came from eight countries, and excreted particles measuring 50 micrometers (about the width of a strand of hair) to 500 micrometers.36

Become a Part of a Global Solution

Society has an affection for all things disposable, leaving a trail of death and destruction. You may be a part of a global solution by becoming a more conscious consumer and giving thought to the manufacturing of the products you buy. Each product also has an effect on you during use and on the environment after disposal.

Few are those who live a zero-waste lifestyle, but each of us may make definitive steps toward reducing plastic trash. Following are some of the most straightforward steps you may take to cut down on plastics usage in your life. Share them with a friend or two and the positive impacts will only continue to be magnified:

Avoid bottled water — Invest in a water filtration system and fill your own reusable glass bottles at home. Testing reveals many bottled water companies use tap water that may or may not have undergone additional filtration. With over 267 toxins found in public tap water, it’s worth the investment to install a high-quality filter and bring your own water wherever you go.

Reduce your use of all things plastic — Here are a few ideas to get started:

Use reusable shopping bags for groceries and reusable cloth or mesh bags for fresh produce

Bring your own mug when purchasing coffee, and skip the lid and straw

Store foods in glass containers or Mason jars as opposed to plastic containers or bags

Take your own leftover container to restaurants

Request no plastic wrap on dry cleaning

Avoid disposable utensils and straws and buy foods in bulk when possible

Seek out nondisposable razors, washable feminine products for women, cloth diapers, handkerchiefs, rags instead of paper towels, and infant toys made of wood rather than plastic

Avoid processed foods (which are stored in plastic bags with chemicals). Buy fresh produce instead, and bring your own cloth or mesh produce bags

Avoid microfiber clothing and/or wash them as infrequently as possible — Select organic fabrics, refuse to participate in “fast fashion,” and buy clothing you truly need and will wear for a long time.

Stretchy fabrics and fleece items shed copious amounts of microscopic plastic fibers each time they’re washed. Due to their tiny size, these microfibers37 flow straight through the wastewater treatment plant without being caught.

Up to 700,000 particles of microfibers leave your washing machine with every wash,38 and testing shows synthetic microfibers make up 85 percent of shoreline debris worldwide.39 Once in the water column, this plastic microdebris blocks sunlight required for plankton and algae to thrive, and the ramifications of which reverberates throughout the entire food chain.

The fibers pose a health hazard to sea life consuming them, and since they bioaccumulate, they act like sponges, soaking up and concentrating toxins found in the environment like PCBs, pesticides and oil, making the animal — which could end up on your plate — even more toxic than it normally would be.

Wash synthetic clothing as irregularly as possible using a mild detergent. Line dry instead of putting them in the dryer, as the heat and agitation will break down fibers. Handwashing or using the gentle cycle with cold water will also minimize the shedding of fibers, as will using a front loading washing machine.

Recycle what you can — Take care to recycle and repurpose products whenever possible, and/or participate in “plastic drives” for local schools, where cash is paid by the pound.

Remember recyclables must never be placed in a plastic bag, as recycling facilities will simply send bagged items to a landfill.40 So, to ensure your recyclables actually get recycled, make sure you place the items loose in your recycle bin.

For more do’s and don'ts of recycling, see “Surprising Recycling Mistakes Most People Make.” You may also check out this Lifehacker article for more information about what you can and cannot recycle in general, over and beyond plastic.41

from Articles http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2019/04/10/plastic-found-in-guts-of-whale.aspx source https://niapurenaturecom.tumblr.com/post/184077445621

[jakehglover]

Major Plastic Problems in Oceans From Clothes

The food chain is an ordered series of organisms, each dependent on the previous as a source of food. In other words, herbivores eat plants to survive and carnivores eat herbivores and other carnivores. In the water, small fish eat plankton, and are then eaten by slightly larger fish, finally eaten by larger fish and then potentially ending up on your dinner plate.

This process has fed the planet from the beginning of time and isn’t changing anytime soon. However, what’s finally ending up on your plate is far different than it was just 70 years ago. As the Earth’s human population has grown and expanded, so have the innovations brought to market by manufacturers and large agrichemical businesses.

Unfortunately, a large portion of those innovations were developed without considering how they would impact the environment and ultimately human life. Permutations and modifications to manufacturing and agribusiness occurs at speeds far greater than safety testing can accommodate.

One consequence of material product transformation was the development of plastics, believed to be nearly indestructible. However, it wasn’t long after the invention of the first synthetic polymer in the early 1900s that we discovered just how false this belief is.

Expedition to Record Volume of Plastic and Its Impact on the Food Chain

Following multiple research studies, environmental assays and the work of activists across the world who discovered our bodies are slowly becoming contaminated with plastic, a group of scientists set out to determine exactly how large the problem of plastics has become in the world’s oceans.

The research voyage, named the “eXXpedition” in reference to an all-female 14 person crew of scientists, writers and activists, is intent on determining how plastics in the ocean are impacting marine life and the rest of the planet.

The crew mans a 72-foot vessel named the Sea Dragon that launched from Hawaii and traversed part of the Pacific North Pacific gyre known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The samples the crew collect will help scientists understand how plastics may pick up other pollutants and transfer them through the food chain.

Founder of the eXXpedition, ocean activist and sailor, Emily Penn, talks about how overwhelming sailing into the Great Pacific Garbage Patch was, now two times the state of Texas:1

“When we sailed into the southern edge of the Gyre, we started to see a piece of plastic over the side of the boat every 10 seconds — a cigarette lighter, a bottle, some sort of container.

Then when you wake up the next morning, and it’s still going, and wake up seven days later, and it’s still going, and you’re 800 miles from the nearest human being — it’s that relentlessness that’s just so overwhelming.”

During the voyage, the crew collects samples of plastic from the air, water and the ocean floor to be analyzed in several labs across the world. Samples collected off the coast of Hawaii were photographed by National Geographic Explorer David Liittschwager.2 He commented on what was collected and photographed, saying, “To me, it's a little shocking how much is in relatively small samples.”

He spread the content on trays to photograph the contents up close, revealing images so dense it is sometimes difficult to discern what was plastic and what was living. While moved by these images of plastic obscuring nature for the past two decades, Liittschwager describes his mission as simply to document what's real and present today, saying, “I'd like people to see what's really there.”

Liittschwager has a history of being curious about nature. Almost 10 years ago he set about to find how many creatures would pass through a 12-inch square area in different environments on land and water, and across different temperature regions.

In total, he and a team of biologists recorded more than 1,000 individual organisms in this small area, speaking to the diversity of each environment.3 This diversity is in danger as he records the early death of albatross chicks after ingesting plastics, plankton and small fish intertwined with microplastics. A team even found plastics labeled from Japan off a remote coast of Canada.

Airborne Plastic Fibers in Marine Environments From Washing Clothes

In one sample from the trip, the team counted more than 500 pieces of microplastic. This extrapolates to half a million pieces in 1 square kilometer (a little over a half-mile) of open sea. However, this is not the total number, as the team did not account for nanoparticles showing up at the lab under a microscope. The Sea Dragon is also packed with samples of ocean air to be analyzed at King's College London.

The crew found airborne microfibers, which may pose a risk to the human respiratory system, are the result of washing clothes, allowing microfiber to enter the ocean through the sewage system. Sarah Dudas, biologist with Fisheries and Oceans Canada, states, “Out of all the plastic particles we found, most of them are textile based”4 — tiny filaments of fabric from clothing made from nylon and polyester.

Much of this pollution is being driven by “fast fashion,” or cheap clothing, which some estimate is the fifth most polluting industry in the world. Although sales of clothing are at an all-time high, utilization has dramatically diminished. This essentially means that while sales have doubled from 50 billion to 100 billion units, the average number of times a garment is worn has significantly dropped.

Unfortunately, the cost of clothing and manufacturing has resulted in treating clothes as a single-use disposable item, creating a rapidly-growing waste problem. Chief among those issues is the use of microfibers that shed in your washing machine.

In one study5 commissioned by apparel maker Patagonia, data revealed a synthetic jacket may release up to 2.7 grams of microfiber with each washing. On average a garment released 1.7 grams, while older jackets released twice as much.6

Wastewater treatment plants are able to filter out just a portion of this debris and the rest inevitably sneaks through, ending up in waterways and eventually the ocean.

The irregular shapes of microfiber pollution make it harder for marine life to excrete than other types of microplastics, contributing to physical blockage in their intestinal tract and chemical poisoning, as the longer the particles stay inside, the more chemicals accumulate in the body.

This may also have ramifications for humans who eat the fish. Researchers have found nearly 25 percent of fish and 33 percent of shellfish purchased at fish markets in California and Indonesia had microfibers in their gut.7

Microfibers Act to Super Concentrate Contaminants

Once in the waterways, the bits of microfibers attract and hold other environmental pollutants, since the plastic is lipophilic. This means they attract oil-based chemicals, such as flame retardants, bisphenols and phthalates.

According to Rolf Halden, director of the Center for Environmental Health Engineering at Arizona State University’s Biodesign Institute, plastics can concentrate these contaminants up to 100,000fold.8

In theory, the plastics may then carry these pollutants to the next creature up the food chain, potentially landing on your dinner plate. You can find plastics in virtually every area of your household, including containers, baby items, electronics and personal care products. As they are discarded, they are literally choking our oceans and polluting our food supply.

Different types of washing machines will release different amounts of microfibers and chemicals from a piece of clothing. Data finds top-loading machines release about 530 percent more than front loading machines.9 Up to 40 percent of microfibers are flushed out of wastewater treatment plants and end up in the surrounding lakes, rivers and eventually the ocean.10

To address this problem, scientists call for appliance companies to consider the addition of filters to catch microfibers. In the meantime, several companies offer products for your washing machine aimed at curbing the release of microfibers from your home.11

In a study led by researchers from the University of Barcelona,12 data quantifies the presence of microfibers on marine floors from the Caribbean Sea to the Black Sea. The results revealed the main types of microfiber were natural cellulose (cotton and linen) and regenerated cellulose (rayon), while polyester was the most common synthetic fiber found.

Anna Sánchez Vidal, lead researcher from a consolidated research group from the University of Barcelona, in collaboration with the University of Plymouth in the U.K., highlights the results of the study, saying:13

"Recent results show ingests of microplastics by different organisms and in different ecosystems, but the specific impact on the organisms is unknown.

It can depend on a wide range of factors, such as features of the microfibers (size, abundance), or chemical substances these absorbed as well as the physiology and ecology (size, feeding, whether they excrete or accumulate, etc.) of marine organisms."

Clothes Are Polluting the Food Supply

Manufacturing modifications and innovations are approved for market release without analysis of their impact on the environment, including human health. It is realistic and urgent to stop these “advancements” since new variations increase the risk the challenge to health is only getting worse.14

Microfibers start by being dumped into rivers and lakes. Sherri Mason, Ph.D., is a chemistry expert at State University of New York Fredonia. The first time she cut open a fish from the Great Lakes, she reports being alarmed by the number of synthetic fibers that seemed to be “weaving themselves into the gastrointestinal tract.”15

The size of microfibers makes them easy to be consumed by fish and the plastic has the potential to bioaccumulate, concentrating toxins higher up the food chain. Although companies like Patagonia and Polartec use recycled bottles to conserve and reduce waste, breaking plastic bottles into millions of fibrous bits of plastic may prove worse than doing nothing at all.

Mason finds plastic microfibers are found in freshwater and saltwater and they are the most common type of debris in smaller bodies of water. Her concern extends to the ability of the microfibers to absorb persistent organic pollutants and concentrate them an animal tissue.16

One of Halden’s concerns is how these tiny pieces of plastic pollution can potentially cross into human tissue and embed in organs, theoretically delivering a toxic payload over many years.17

Sustainable Fashion Is Within Reach

According to BBC investigative reporter Stacey Dooley, reporting in the BBC documentary “Fashion’s Dirty Secrets,” fashion is second only to oil on the list of top five most polluting industries in the world.

You have the opportunity to help fix this system by selecting organic fabrics, refusing to participate in “fast fashion” and only buying clothes you truly need and will wear for a long time. Although sometimes referred to as “retail therapy,” the effect of buying new clothes to help you feel relaxed and, perhaps, prettier or popular, lasts only a short time, while the pollution generated lasts a lifetime.

The results of the study from the University of Barcelona found cotton microfibers had the highest concentration on the ocean floor. Adding insult to injury is the effect nonorganic cotton has on the environment as it relates to the devastating impact on freshwater supplies.

The use of pesticides, dyes and chemicals and the immense amount of water needed to produce and process cotton further adds to the enormity of the problem. For more information about “fast fashion,” the impact on your health and strategies you may use to make a difference, see “Top 7 Ways to Support Sustainable Fashion.”

from HealthyLife via Jake Glover on Inoreader http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2019/02/20/microfiber-pollution.aspx

[sherristockman]

Toxic Algae and Red Tide — The Steep Cost of Factory Farms Dr. Mercola By Dr. Mercola Florida is well-known for its aquatic wildlife — a natural resource that is now being rapidly decimated by the influence of factory farms and chemical agriculture, combined with the unpredictable forces of nature. Over the past 10 months, scores of manatees, dolphins, turtles, eels, crabs and other marine animals have washed ashore, dead, killed by toxic Karenia brevis algae — known as red tide — which now covers the east and west coasts. Lake Okeechobee, which is the source of the problem, is also choked by another algal organism — blue-green cyanobacteria. Both the red tide organism and cyanobacteria are fed by excess nutrients such as phosphorous and nitrogen from agricultural fertilizers. These toxic algae also pose a threat to human health. Exposure through inhalation may trigger respiratory distress; topically it may cause skin rashes, while accidental ingestion can lead to vomiting and kidney failure. As reported by One Green Planet:1 "[T]oxic algae is spreading through the coastal waters of South Florida, causing what is known as a 'red tide' to form, and it is killing wildlife at alarming rates due to lack of oxygen. The explosion of wildlife-killing algae in the area is largely a result of agricultural runoff linked to the Big Sugar industry." Largest, Longest Red Tide in Decades Hundreds of dead manatees and even a massive whale shark have washed ashore since October 2017, when the red tide began. Turtles have been hardest hit, including Kemp's Ridley sea turtles, which are on the critically endangered list. As noted by Bob Wasno, a marine biologist with Florida Gulf Coast University:2 "Back in 1994 we had an outbreak and it killed 196 manatees. Everybody was just completely outraged. They yelled and jumped up and down and said 'This is not going to happen again.' Here we are 24 years later and this is worse than ever." In 2016, the Florida algal bloom in Lake Okeechobee drew attention after persisting from May through midsummer, covering 33 square miles and spreading to the coasts.3 A state of emergency was declared in three of the hardest-hit counties on the Atlantic coast, as well as one county on the Gulf coast. That was nothing, though, compared to what we're facing now. The red tide, which covers an estimated 100 miles of coastline and stretches miles offshore, has persisted for 10 months and still shows no signs of abating. What's Happening in Lake Okeechobee? As noted in the featured video, the waters of Lake Okeechobee originally drained south into the Everglades, "one of the most biologically diverse regions on Earth." Over time, however, swampland was transformed into farmland. Then, in 1928, a massive hurricane hit the area, causing Lake Okeechobee to overflow, with floodwaters spreading across hundreds of miles. Some 2,500 residents were killed in the storm surge. To prevent a repeat of this deadly event, the Herbert Hoover dike was built around the lake. Instead of draining south, the lake now drains to the east and west coasts via man-made canals. As Okeechobee no longer fed water into the Everglades, more swampland dried up, and the sugar industry moved in. Meanwhile, cattle ranches and dairy farms congregated to the north of the lake.4 Together, these industries have created a perfect storm in Lake Okeechobee. Phosphorous-rich manure is leaching from the factory farms in the north, while fertilizer-rich water gets pumped into the lake from the south, and it is these fertilizer chemicals, primarily phosphorus but also nitrogen, that feed the toxic algae in the lake. Another relatively surprising source of phosphorus is glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, which is the most widely used herbicide in conventional farming. According to University of Miami scientists Larry Brand and Angela Compton, K. brevis blooms were thirteenfold to eighteenfold more abundant along the southwest Florida coast between 1994 and 2002 compared to 1954 to 1963, and the reason for this was human-released nutrients such as fertilizer runoff.5 Lake Okeechobee Destroyed by Industrial Farming Practices A major problem with the sugar cane fields is that they still use the old system of back-pumping excess water from the fields into Lake Okeechobee. According to Martin County district data, an estimated 8.7 billion gallons of nutrient-rich water from the sugar fields in the south were back-pumped last year.6 The back-pumping, combined with two serious storms, Harvey and Irma, created a situation where an unusual concentration of cyanobacteria formed in the lake, starting around October 2017. The water from Lake Okeechobee, thick with algae, then flows through the canals to the ocean on the east and west coasts, slowly spreading outward. In the video above, you can clearly see it — the lake water looks like coffee compared to the clear blue ocean water. While red tide is a natural occurrence, it would typically occur much farther offshore. With the toxic runoff from Lake Okeechobee, however, the red tide hugs the shoreline, killing all marine life in its path. As noted by Heather Barron, head veterinarian at Florida's Clinic for the Rehabilitation of Wildlife, "Anything that can leave has, and anything that couldn't has died."7 According to National Geographic:8 "Background K. brevis concentrations usually fall below 1,000 cells per liter. Yet in recent counts, many sites tip the scales at over 10 million cells per liter, says Richard Bartleson, a biologist at Sanibel-Captiva Conservation Foundation, who has been monitoring the bloom's intensity. In select spots, he's seen counts up to 140 million cells per liter. Animals accidentally ingest the algae while feeding, which makes them 'almost comatose,' says Gretchen Lovewell, program manager for Mote Marine Laboratory's Stranding Investigations Program … But most, she says, are already dead." The concentration of nutrients in the water also allows the red tide to persist far longer than normal. It’s been 10 months, and it still shows no signs of abating. Part of the solution would be to reestablish water flow from Okeechobee to the Everglades. For this to happen, the state would have to buy at least part of the land back from the sugar industry. As of yet, this has not happened, and environmental activists cite "lack of political will" as a primary reason for this failure. Algae Blooms Traced Back to Sewage Sludge Aside from synthetic fertilizers, manure and glyphosate, there's yet another nutrient source that appears to play a role in toxic algal blooms: sewage sludge, also known as biosolids. This human waste is frequently used as a "natural" fertilizer. A July 15, 2018, article9 in the Florida Times-Union reported a breakout of algae bloom at the head of St. Johns River — a typically pristine area — may have been caused by the sludge runoff: "'We're seeing green algae throughout the headwaters,' said St. Johns Riverkeeper Lisa Rinaman, who told state officials this spring that algae-feeding phosphorus and nitrogen might be seeping into the lake from a minimally cleaned variety of sewage sludge that's spread over nearby ranch land." While the Florida Department of Environmental Protection has shied away from blaming sludge, it, along with St. Johns River Water Management District, has agreed to study the problem, and has placed a six-month temporary ban on the use of biosolids at a 3,000-acre ranch west of the lake. According to the article, "County commissioners started discussing a six-month moratorium for the entire county last month, but have moved cautiously to avoid any legal landmines." According to researchers, there's been a significant increase in the use of sludge in the area, starting in 2013. Since 2012, the amount of phosphorous added to the upper basin has more than doubled. In 2016 alone, 70,000 tons of sewer sludge were allowed to be disposed in the river’s upper basin. According to Edith Widder, biochemist and founder of the Ocean Research and Conservation Association, "there's pretty clear evidence of biosolids" in the St. Johns watershed. The problem with biosolids has been clearly detailed by David Lewis, Ph.D., whom I interviewed in 2015. Chemicals known to be problematic in the part per billion or trillion in water and air are concentrated millions of times higher in sewage sludge which, when applied to farmland, deposit these toxins into the soil. Rain and irrigation runoff then transport the toxins into waterways and groundwater. What's more, biosolids are not counted toward fertilizer use. This loophole can give the false appearance that agricultural fertilizers aren't as big a problem as you might think. Farmers may proudly claim they've cut down on fertilizers, when in fact they've just switched to biosolids, which aren't counted, yet deposit even more toxins and result in the same kind of environmental devastation, including algal blooms in waterways. Petition Calls for Action A White House petition has now been created, urging the federal government to call on Congress to clean up Lake Okeechobee and take steps to prevent future algae blooms. According to the petition: "Lake Okeechobee is covered in cyanobacteria, polluting our waterways to the East via St. Lucie River and West via Caloosahatchee River … We are seeing an influx of red tide on our beaches killing countless amounts of fish, turtles, birds, marine plants and other life. These animals survive on the delicate balance that is being disrupted by human and chemical interference whether it be agriculture, runoff or dumping. Many persons living on canals and waterways are becoming severely ill. Our politicians are not making the everglades restoration as part of Florida legacy amendment 1, a priority as per legislation passed in 2014. Our economy relies on tourism, fishing and many water related industries. Please save our waters!" It needs 100,000 signatures in order to receive a response from the White House. If you'd like to add your name to the petition, you may do so here. >>>>> Click Here <<<<< Agricultural Changes Are Necessary to Stop Toxic Algal 'Plagues' Florida is not alone in its struggle. Not only are many of the world's lakes at risk due to agricultural chemicals feeding harmful blue-green algae, but at the bottom of the Mississippi River lies the largest dead zone on the planet. As reported by MPR News:10 "This particular dead zone at the Mississippi's mouth is a swath of ocean, big as New Jersey at its peak, that's choked for oxygen. There, native plants die. Marine animals move away, or die … All Midwestern states drain into the Mississippi. Those states have intensive agriculture, too, which uses huge amounts of fertilizer … Nitrogen and phosphorus wash into the watershed during rains … Once in waterways, the nutrients become pollutants … At the bottom of the Mississippi, all the excess nutrients wind up in the same spot and dump into the Gulf of Mexico. There, they form algae blooms, which demand oxygen from the Gulf's waters. The blooms grow and spread quickly, leaving native wildlife with less oxygen. Climate change exacerbates the problem as warming ocean temps make it easier for algae to grow — and take up more oxygen in the water. What's left is a dead zone." That our agriculture is causing such enormous environmental devastation is inexcusable. There's no reason for this insanity, as there are solid, proven ways to farm without synthetic fertilizers and other toxic chemicals, including glyphosate. On an individual level, you can help by buying food from organic, or better yet biodynamic, farmers who rely on natural methods and soil-regenerative techniques, such as no-till, cover crops, composting and livestock integration. This will naturally help you to eat better too, since typically only real whole foods are grown this way, while most processed foods are the product of destructive industrial nitrogen fertilizer-laden and glyphosate-heavy agriculture. Biochar Bank Could Be an Important Part of the Solution While we certainly need major industry changes, getting main offenders like Big Sugar to change its ways is not going to happen easily, or quickly. Still, there are things that could be implemented fairly rapidly that could make a big difference. One such technology is described in the Virginia Tech paper “Denitrifying Bioreactors: An Emerging Best Management Practice to Improve Water Quality,”11 which essentially involves installing biochar filtration to catch runoff from agricultural sites and catch excess nutrients before they’re released from the lake. If water were released more slowly over time instead of allowing for the rapid discharge of contaminated water into the canals that lead to the coastal waters, it could be treated with a biochar filtration system. Around the lake, the biochar would work as a water filter to recapture the fertilizers before the water enters the ocean. These biochar borders or banks could also be set up around major agricultural sites to soak up runoff nutrients. As noted in this paper: “Research has shown that successful nitrogen removal can be obtained in these field scale systems for up to 15 years even with fluctuating in influent nitrate concentrations and flow rates. This tolerance to variable in influent enables application of DNBRs [denitrifying bioreactors] to treat a wide range of non-point source pollution, such as that created by agriculture, where conventional wastewater treatment is cost-prohibitive. Some of the greatest potential for DNBR use is in agricultural settings, where nitrogen loss to groundwater is the dominant pathway.” Stay Out of the Water During Algae Bloom It's important to note that if you see signs warning of harmful algae blooms, stay out of the water and keep your pets out too. Even if there are no signs present, avoid entering water that smells bad, looks discolored or has foam, scum or algae mats on the surface. If you suspect there could be a problem, you're better off safe than sorry, and be aware that algae toxins can be present in the water even if there's no visible algae on the surface. In addition, avoid consuming any water that could be contaminated with algae toxins, even if the water has been boiled. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC),12 "Boiling water does not remove algal toxins and can increase the amount of toxin in the water by concentrating it," so you'll need to find an alternative source of water if an advisory is issued in your area. Lastly, if you live in Florida, either on a boat or near the water, you can volunteer to perform water testing to establish better data and monitoring. To learn more, see the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s Volunteer Monitoring Program page.

[hudsonespie]

2020 Will Shape the Future of the Oceans

[By Fermín Koop]

“Our house is on fire,” said Swedish activist Greta Thunberg at the beginning of 2019. Her statement resonated throughout the year, with temperature records broken in many countries, an unusually intense wildfire season in the Amazon, and the ocean continuing to lose oxygen.

Millions took to the streets to vent their feelings at governments for not doing enough. In December, protesters inside the COP25 UN climate change conference in Madrid summed up a year of growing boldness, and frustration.

While society and many sectors of the economy will continue to take their own action to help protect the environment in 2020, there is still time to accelerate last year’s slow progress in the international arena, at landmark global summits on the oceans, biodiversity and climate change.

The global ocean

In June, a UN “high-level meeting” will be held in Lisbon, Portugal to advance the implementation of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) number 14 on life below water.

There is a total of 17 SDGS, designed to eradicate poverty, protect the planet and ensure prosperity.

Agreed by UN member countries in 2015, each objective has specific targets attached to it. Some of the SDG 14 targets are supposed to be met in 2020. These include putting an end to unsustainable fishing of all kinds; prohibiting fishing subsidies that encourage overfishing; and conserving at least 10% of coastal and marine areas.

“Several of the goals are far from being met,” said Loreley Picourt, director of politics and international affairs at the Ocean and Climate Platform. “In addition to evaluating them, we will begin to discuss the next ones by 2020. But we must see what is the point of doing it if many were not fulfilled.”

This second set of “high-level talks”, over which Portugal and Kenya will preside, will seek to elicit voluntary commitments to support SDG 14.

The ocean will also feature strongly in November’s COP26 climate conference. Despite it coming up well short, COP25’s final decision text did highlight the link between climate and ocean and agreed to begin a dialogue on the matter, starting with a meeting in June.

Countries are also expected to include specific mentions of the ocean in their new contributions to fighting the climate crisis, to be presented prior to COP26. Some, such as the South Pacific island nation of Tuvalu, have already taken the lead here.

“The COP26 presidency mentioned that it wants the oceans to remain on the agenda, suggesting that discussions on the links between the climate and ocean will continue,” said Rémi Parmentier, coordinator of Because the Ocean, an initiative joined by 30 countries to incorporate the ocean in climate change policy.

Overfishing

The World Trade Organisation (WTO) will hold its annual meeting in Kazakhstan in June. Among its various objectives will be the elimination of harmful fishing subsidies. The issue has been under discussion for more than two decades, but progress has been sorely lacking.

SDG 14, which will be the focus of the oceans conference in Portugal, includes among its goals the elimination of fisheries subsidies by 2020. The subsidies granted to the fishing industry amount to approximately US$35 billion annually, according to the Fisheries Committee of the European Parliament.

Fishing subsidies distort world fish markets and hit fish populations. But developing countries want to protect subsidies, which they say support low-income fishers.

Around 60% of the world’s studied fish are fully exploited and 30% are overexploited, according to the SOFIA 2016 report, published by the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization.

“The WTO negotiations on subsidies have advanced too slowly and the WTO knows that. Action at the highest political level is needed. It is no longer enough to leave the discussions in the hands of technical negotiators,” Parmentier said.

Biodiversity

In October, Kunming in southwestern China will host the 15th COP to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), a crucial meeting to establish a new plan for biodiversity protection.

The conference has been called the “Paris Summit for biodiversity”, hoping to match the 2015 meeting that resulted in a global pact to tackle climate change.

In 2010, the 194 countries that form the CBD approved the Strategic Plan for Biological Diversity 2011-2020. Talks in Aichi, Japan, delivered 20 general objectives, known as the Aichi targets, to end biodiversity loss and restore ecosystems.

But most goals have not been met. China’s stewardship of the talks will look to preserve the Aichi targets as a minimum basis, and add new elements to ensure compliance.

“Biodiversity is experiencing a decline unprecedented in the history of mankind,” said Obdulio Menghi, a biologist and president of the Argentine Biodiversity Foundation. “It’s not just species of animals and plants, all ecosystems are being affected.”

Global populations of fish, birds, mammals, amphibians and reptiles decreased an average 60% between 1970 and 2014, the most recent year for which data is available, according to the WWF Living Planet Index. The decrease affects nature’s function to provide the world with fresh air, drinking water and other vital services.

There are five driving forces behind the decline in biodiversity, according to a major UN report published last year: changes in land and sea use; the direct exploitation of organisms; climate change; pollution; and invasive species.

“A transformative change is needed, according to IPBES. We cannot continue with the current production and consumption system. It is an emergency situation,” said Ana Di Pangracio, deputy executive director of the Argentine Environment and Natural Resources Foundation (FARN).

Climate change

In November, the city of Glasgow in Scotland will host the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26) on climate change. It faces huge challenges in resolving everything left over from previous years and spurring countries to be more ambitious in their efforts.

COP25 was meant to advance key points for the implementation of the Paris Agreement, such as the creation of an international carbon market and securing financing from developed countries to developing countries. However, it was a resounding failure with progress made only on a gender action plan.

“COP had clear mandates in Madrid but unfortunately it did not fulfil them. This year the original objective was to focus on achieving greater ambition. But now we will continue to drag out outstanding issues,” says Enrique Maurtua Konstantinidis, senior climate policy advisor for FARN.

Diplomats and other observers suggest the UK get to work on building support for the negotiations immediately, going from capital to capital as the French did in advance of the Paris summit. This could help generate preliminary agreements and create a more congenial environment in 2020 than the zero-sum game the talks have become.

Through the 2015 Paris Agreement, countries committed to limit global warming to 2C compared to pre-industrial levels. However, based on national contributions (known as NDCs) already submitted, the world is heading for rises of between 3 and 4C.

This year, countries are expected to update their NDCs, which should accelerate emissions reductions. However, only 80 countries representing 10% of global emissions have presented improvement plans.

Fermín Koop is an Argentine journalist, specialising in the environment with experience across diverse publications such as the Buenos Aires Herald, Clarín, Ámbito Financiero, Buena Salud and Notio Noticias.

The original version of this article was published on Dialogo Chino. It appears courtesy of China Dialogue Ocean and may be found in its English translation here. 

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