Robert Vrolyk

Ms. K. Philips

ENG 4U

April 08 20171

Ocean Sustainability
How might our bodies of water be affected by the 7 billion people using them in

waste disposal? They are already changing for the worse, we are currently

contaminating the oceans and rivers much faster than we are cleaning them with

plastics, fibres, and drugs. More plastic is being made every year but we still have no

solution to plastic buildup in our oceans. Pharmaceuticals are still being found in our

rivers and drinking water. Wasteful plastic packaging is quickly accumulating in the

ocean and the plastic fibers that are washed down the drain while washing certain

synthetic materials are being introduced to the aquatic food chain. The effects are

widespread, nearly every species depends on a source of water for life and smaller

animals are often more vulnerable to contaminants in the water than us. However the

long-term effects on humans are still largely unknown and could be just as devastating

years from now.

Synthesising plastic was first made possible and affordable in 1907, it has since

been used in countless products and innovations. Plastic bags are arguably one of the

worlds most successful inventions utilizing a remarkably small amount of material and

supporting a reasonable weight. Despite the potential benefits plastic bags are another

example of a piece of plastic serving a very short period of usefulness before spending

hundreds of years decomposing. In 2001 the United States Environmental Protection

Agency estimated somewhere between 500 billion and 1 trillion bags were consumed

worldwide every year. Consume in this case means recycling roughly 35% of the bags

assuming you living in Ontario, of the remaining 65% that are littered or thrown in a

landfill an estimated 80% will end up in the ocean. This is because so many plastic

products lose their usefulness shortly after being sold, plastic wrappers arent always

recyclable or labeled as such, they are simply torn apart and thrown on the ground. Even

when you hold onto your plastic to throw in the garbage there is a good chance it will

end up in the ocean, any piece of trash caught in the wind is likely to end up in the ocean

eventually. Most of the plastic pollution was originally ground litter making its way from

the ground to a river and eventually out into the ocean. Some success was found with

netting off the mouths of rivers to capture plastic making its way downstream, the

method succeeded in capturing plastic but more work was needed to allow fish up and

down the stream unhindered. Plastic waste can take up to 1000 years to decompose

and our production of plastic continues to increase while our recycling methods lag
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behind. As a larger piece the plastic poses a choking hazard to fish and birds, while its

breaking down the plastic also serves as a sponge for persistent organic compounds or

POPs. There is evidence suggesting that POPs might enter the food web in this manner

as the compounds are transferred from the plastic to the animal. The plastic has many

chances to be eaten at different steps of the food chain as it shrinks and breaks down

into tiny microplastics. At that size microplastics often become embedded in animals

tissue through respiration or ingestion exposing them to the absorbed chemicals, this

problem is compounded as you move up the food chain and predators eat dozens of

prey each potentially carrying their own plastic. This plastic can also carry POPs such

as: Aldicarb which is toxic to the nervous system, Benzene which causes chromosomal

damage among other effects, Carbon tetrachloride a powerful carcinogen, chloroform,

dioxin, ethylene dibromide, and more. Although acute toxicity is rare the frequent

presence of these pollutants and their ability to enter the food web could have

dangerous long-term or cumulative effects. There is no easy way to reverse this plastic

buildup, even with ocean clean up initiatives we cannot hope to outpace the buildup of

plastic without reducing the amount that we consume. A study from 2016 estimates

more than 17 billion pounds of plastic ends up in the ocean every year, this same study

estimates more plastic than fish in the ocean by 2050 if we continue at our current rate.

Another issue with disposing of plastic responsibly is the variety, there are many

different compounds that fall under the name plastic. When the recycling truck comes
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around to your neighborhood they dont stop to make sure youve only included the

plastics your municipality is equipped to recycle. At the recycling plant waste is often

hand sorted with a moderate amount of error, many packages advertised for being

recyclable are only technically so with little to no market for recycling of that type in that

area. The recycling symbol is actually just an identifier for the resins used in that

plastic, many people assume the symbol means a package can be recycled however

this is not the case. Most municipalities only support the select few materials they have

the equipment and market to recycle. There are a lot of misconceptions on what can be

recycled and even if the material is supported sorters will only take it if its clean

enough, pizza boxes for example are technically recyclable if you manage to remove the

grease but otherwise are just garbage. Similarly water bottles with labels or caps are

likely to be thrown out with so much recycling to sort, items that are not quite ready for

recycling are simply rejected so the machine doesnt jam and so the recycled material is

as pure and clean as possible. The result is an inefficient recycling system jammed with

materials that cant even be recycled. So inefficient in fact that only about 9% of plastic

in the US is recycled. Without changes soon we will continue to out produce our

recycling capabilities and cause even more damage to the aquatic food web. As a

consumer you can buy biodegradable over recyclable if you arent sure your city takes

that kind of plastic, and you can make sure youre recyclables are actually being

recycled by separating any different materials and washing beforehand.

Packaging isnt the only way plastic is making its way into our oceans, when

washing clothing made of polyesters, polyamides, polypropylene, or any mix of the

materials, microfibers are rinsed down your drain where more than 40% of them will

make their way to the ocean. What are these microfibers? Well they arent new, in 2011

Mark Browne found that microfibers made up 85% of human-made debris on shorelines

around the world. The plastic microfibers maintain the toxin soaking properties of

microplastics with the added risk of entangling themselves in the digestive tracts of

smaller animals. Furthermore there is the potential for microfibers accumulating and

moving up the food chain. The effects on animals and potentially humans are still being

researched but a study in which crabs ate doo with microfibers resulted in the crabs

eating less and suggested a stunted growth overall. The bigger concern, says Sherri

Mason a researcher on microfibres is ... not necessarily with the plastic fibers

themselves, but with their ability to absorb persistent organic pollutants such as

polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), and to concentrate them in animals tissues. These

are the same pollutants concentrated by decomposing microplastics but they arent

equally common everywhere, with microplastics more commonly found in indonesian

specimens and microfibers found more often in the US specimens. This could be

because high performance fibers are more popular in the US than elsewhere but

switching materials might not be necessary. Plastic Soup Foundation, an amsterdam

based project working on ocean conservation suggests an anti-shed treatment for

clothing to ensure higher quality materials or a ball to collect the fibres from your

washing machine. There are no actions being taken by textile or washer industries but

both seem to be conducting research and aware of the issue. Ill Notini, vice president of

communications and marketing for the Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers

said, How do you possibly retrofit all of the units that are in the market and then add a

filter in and talk to consumers and say, Here is a new thing that youre going to have to

do with your clothes washer? in response to suggestions regarding a filter for washing

machines. So as of now there are few options to avoid contributing micro fibres, though

there is pressure on the plastic industry and the appliance/textile industry to take

responsibility. Its good that the issue has come to light and seems to be being addressed

so soon but we dont know how much damage has already been done. With research as

old as 2012 indicating microfibre pollution as one of the most abundant sources of man-

made debris, there was plenty of time for action before now and 5 more years of

microfibre pollution could have been avoided. With 7 billion people on this planet even

something as small as washing your clothes can start to have consequences. Washers

with a filter for example, wouldnt have been much more expensive to make but now

theres no easy way to replace them all, we could have been 5 years into fixing that but

instead were still waiting on a statement from the producers.

Water treatment facilities have to meet strict requirements to ensure water is safe

to drink, the water is tested for dangerous levels of various substances and then we

drink it or dump it in the river. There are 65 chemicals that need to be under the

maximum concentrations according to the safe drinking water act but these chemicals
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are encountered in different amounts in different places. The amount of filtration used

is only whats needed in that area to bring any chemicals in high concentrations under

the limit. The standards are regularly updated but completely neglect several substances

not filtered out by our water treatment. Most pharmaceuticals for example arent

targeted by water treatment facilities and anywhere from 20% to 90% of the compounds

are still present after filtration depending on the treatment facility. Although the levels

are low enough to be considered insignificant to humans they do not occur naturally in

the environment and are at high enough concentrations to be of environmental concern.

Unnatural compounds found include, antibiotics, antidepressants, antipsychotics

amphetamine, acetaminophen, and many other pharmaceuticals. Even at the low levels

considered harmless to humans the potential long term effects of regularly being

exposed to these compounds are concerning. The active compounds in the water comes

partly from flushed medication but 90% of the active compounds were excreted

meaning even after being digested and treated as sewage the drug was still at least

partially effective. This also means that the concentrations of pharmaceuticals in the

water could continue to rise as we consume roughly 15% more medication every year it

would stand to reason that levels in water would follow suit. Although acute toxic effects

as a result of these low concentrations are next to impossible in humans; reproductive

and neurological problems in animals drinking or living in the affected water have been

found as a result of the substances. Kelly Crowe a health and science correspondent with

CBC says, The immediate concern was for fish swimming in this pharmaceutical soup.

And over the last decade, scientists have proven the drugs are creating "intersex" fish,

with males developing eggs in their testes, putting the survival of some species in
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jeopardy. Although the effects on fish are unsettling even more so is our understanding

of the effects on humans, or the lack thereof, scientists still dont know if these

pharmaceuticals are affecting human health. Thats because almost no one studies this,

primarily because most experts assume the risk is minimal., This is because the

concentrations in our water are much below the recommended therapeutic doses but we

still dont know the effects of the combination of drugs over a lifetime. The biggest

barrier to research here is the complexity, determining any effects and attributing them

to the pharmaceuticals is no easy task with nearly every species affected in many ways

by many sources. A lot of time, money, and resources would be necessary to explain the

effects even more so to study the long term effects on people, in order to gather any

information a very long study with a huge sample size would be required. Until then

little is being done, because there is no sure threat this issue is still unresolved despite

being discovered as early as 2009. The World Health Organization published a brochure

on the potential risks of pharmaceuticals in drinking water and states there is very little

chance of significant effects on humans, they acknowledge the possibility of long-term

effects but insist they are unlikely. Although the risks for humans drinking water is low

the effects on the aquatic food web are disturbing. A study on the ecological effect of

pharmaceuticals found that even models including bioaccumulation and trophic levels

underestimated the accumulation of pharmaceuticals in fish. Furthermore they found

different effects on different species, though in almost every case some behavior,

hormonal function, or reproductive function was altered even at the minute

concentrations found in our water. The implications of this are huge, so huge its really

hard to say what they are. Despite that weve only increased our pharmaceutical intake
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and by extension our pharmaceutical output. There is some research being done but no

plans to retrofit water treatment or take any other actions. The stress we are putting on

our marine ecosystems with all of these changes to their habitat is enormous and

dangerous when people depend on fish as their primary food source.

As our population grows so does the strain we put on our environment to meet
our individual needs. In order to be sustainable we need to come up with ways to
maintain our environment for every way we come up with to exploit it. Consumers and
producers alike need to change the way they see and use plastic, its not the super
recyclable material people assume and its not being recycled the way many people
assume. Microfibres are and will continue to be a problem with the potential to get out
of hand if we dont start filtering them soon. Lastly, pharmaceuticals in our water are
having a slight effect on a massive ecological scale. These are just some of the
practises currently polluting our water and they may have been harmless once but on a
long enough timeline with enough people we can cause significant damage. If we dont
change the way we use our oceans the effects may get to the point where its too late to
reverse them.