Marine Debris Fact Sheet

• Marine debris is any man-made object discarded, disposed of, or abandoned that enters the coastal or marine environment. It may enter directly from a ship, or indirectly when washed out to sea via rivers, streams and storm drains; even garbage dropped kilometers from shore can make its way to the ocean.

• Marine debris, mainly plastic, is killing more than a million seabirds and 100,000 mammals, sharks and sea turtles each year, through entanglement and ingestion.

• 80% of plastic in the ocean originated from the land.

• North Americans consume and discard about 2.75 million plastic water and pop bottles per hour. That equals 24 billion a year.

• 267 marine species are affected by plastic garbage.

• 44% of all seabirds eat plastic by mistake.

• Big pieces of plastic look like jellyfish or squid, while small pieces look like fish eggs.

• The amount of plastic particles in the ocean has at least tripled since the 1960s.

• There are six pounds of plastic for every pound of algae in the ocean.

• There is 6 times more plastic than plankton in the middle of the Pacific.

• Nurdles, also known as mermaids' tears, are plastic pellets typically under five millimeter in diameter, and are a major component of marine debris. They are used as a raw material in plastics manufacturing, and are thought to enter the natural environment after accidental spillages. Mermaids' tears are also created by the physical weathering of larger plastic debris. Nurdles strongly resemble fish eggs or roe.

• It has been estimated that container ships lose over 10,000 containers at sea each year (usually during storms).

• Plastic doesn’t biodegrade, it “photo-degrades” – a process in which it is broken down by sunlight into smaller and smaller pieces, all of which are still plastic polymers, eventually becoming individual molecules of plastic, still too tough for anything to digest.

• Plastic shopping bags may clog digestive tracts when consumed and may cause starvation through restricting the movement of food, or by filling the stomach and tricking the animal into thinking it is full.

• It is estimated that there are 18,000 pieces of plastic in every sq km of ocean.

• Electronic waste, cellphones and computers, is the fastest growing stream of garbage. Most is shipped overseas but some is finding its way into the ocean.

• It’s not just entanglement and indigestion that are problems caused by plastic debris. There is a darker side to pollution by plastic fragments. As these fragments float around, they accumulate the poisons that are not water-soluble. Plastic polymers are sponges for DDT, PCBs and nonylphenols-oily toxins that don’t dissolve in seawater. Plastic pellets accumulate up to one million times the level of these poisons that are floating in the water itself. These are not like heavy metal poisons which affect the animal that ingests them directly. Rather, they are what might be called “second generation “ toxins. Animals have evolved receptors for elaborate organic molecules called hormones, which regulate brain activity and reproduction. Hormone receptors cannot distinguish these toxins from the natural estrogenic hormone, estradiol, and when the pollutants dock at these receptors instead of the natural hormone. The whole issue of hormone disruption is becoming one of, if not the biggest environmental issue of the 21st Century. Hormone disruption has been implicated in lower sperm counts and higher ratios of females to males in both humans and animals. Unchecked, this trend is a dead end for any species.

• Great Pacific Garbage Patch or Pacific Trash Vortex is a gyre of marine debris in the central North Pacific Ocean. Although the exact size is unknown, it has been estimated to be the size of the State of Texas, containing 3.5 million tones of garbage. Debris is concentrated in this patch due to the currents of the North Pacific Gyre. The gyre has a clockwise circular pattern and comprises four prevailing ocean currents: the North Pacific Current to the north, the California Current to the east, the North Equatorial Current to the south, and the Kuroshio Current to the west. It was discovered in 1997.

• In 2005, collisions with floating or submerged waste objects in the ocean caused 269 boating accidents, which resulted in 15 deaths, 116 injuries, and nearly 3 million dollars in property damage.

• Top eight things found during beach cleans:

1. Food wrappers/containers

2. Plastic bags

3. Caps/lids

4. Cups, plates, forks, knives, and spoons

5. Beverage cans

6. Beverage bottles

7. Straws/stir sticks

8. Tobacco packaging/wrappers

• Things we can do:

1. Use cloth bags, or for single items, decline a bag.

2. Recycle as much as possible and properly dispose of everything else.

3. Money talks-don’t support companies that overly package their products.

4. Pick up a few pieces of garbage when at the beach or on a walk.

5. Use a reusable water bottle; we are lucky to have good tap water.

6. Use a reusable coffee mug; many shops give a discount for bringing your own mug.

7. If staying in the coffee shop, tell your barista, your drink is “for here” and decline a paper cup.

8. Do not let balloons loose into the environment.

9. Decline giveaways. Just because it’s free doesn’t mean you need it.

10. Fruits and veggies don’t need bags; you are going to wash and/or peel them anyway.