Over 4 Billion Plastic Particles From Around The World Found On Remote Pacific Island
Over four billion pieces of plastic from around the world has travelled and landed in the sand of a remote Pacific Island.
This discovery (published in Marine Pollution Bulletin) was made by researchers from the Natural History Museum on Henderson Island -- one of the four Pitcairn Islands, 3000 miles away from South America.
Considered as one of the last remaining untouched islands on Earth, it was awarded a UNESCO World Heritage Status.
The team had first visited the uninhabited island in 2015 when they saw the presence of plastic limited to two grams per square metre. However, when they returned to the island four years later, in 2019 they were shocked to discover that this had gone up to 23 grams per square metre.
The three beaches on the islands were covered in all kinds of plastic crap that had travelled hundreds and thousands of miles via powerful currents of the ocean.
From the debris, the researchers discovered within two inches of the sand, most of them were decades old. They found toys first released in the 80s and 90s.
Dr Alex Bond, the senior author of the study, explains, “Pitcairn is the only island inhabited with a human population but none of the trash comes from there. We found pieces of plastic that were from Europe, Africa, North America, South America and Asia. They get into the oceans and are bought here.”
Researchers reveal that sources of plastic pollution come from a variety of places including fishing, agriculture as well as other human activities on the beaches.
But the most impactful source of this pollution is from waste disposal systems that are poor at filtering out microplastics before releasing wastewater into the ocean.
Dr Bond asks for plastic pollution to be considered as a global issue and to be dealt with in a cooperative manner on a global level.
He added, “I think we're going to slowly see a shift from cleaning up plastics to treating it like other contaminants like lead and mercury, where we know they're going to persist in the environment for millennia. Then it'll be how we go about managing it that becomes important.”