Plastic Bag Found at the Bottom of World's Deepest Ocean Trench (nationalgeographic.com) 166
The Mariana Trench -- the deepest point in the ocean -- extends nearly 36,000 feet down in a remote part of the Pacific Ocean. But if you thought the trench could escape the global onslaught of plastics pollution, you would be wrong. From a report: A recent study revealed that a plastic bag, like the kind given away at grocery stores, is now the deepest known piece of plastic trash, found at a depth of 36,000 feet inside the Mariana Trench. Scientists found it by looking through the Deep-Sea Debris Database, a collection of photos and videos taken from 5,010 dives over the past 30 years that was recently made public.
Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
But if you thought the trench could escape the global onslaught of plastics pollution, you would be wrong.
Why would I, or anyone, think that?
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"Why would I, or anyone, think that?"
Remember that floating island of plastic garbage? Things that float are on surface. How on earth a bag got from the surface all the way down to the bottom of the ocean I can't even imagine... Cthulhu aliens must have pulled it down.
Re: Why? (Score:3)
That's what I was thinking. What stops a bag from falling? There is debris on the bottom of oceans, the depths should be irrelevant.
Re: Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Why? (Score:4, Interesting)
Polyethelene is less dense than water so if it's clean and empty then it will float. However an item in the bag or even a bit of sand washed inside could easilly push it over the edge into sinking.
Re: Why? (Score:5, Interesting)
That's why if we required that plastic be denser than seawater, that would get rid of most of the problem - not because it would sink in the ocean, but because it would sink at the first place where it was dumped into water, in telltale accumulations. Currently, no one knows where all this plastic is being dumped.
Re: Why? (Score:3)
Yes we do, dirty filty people who don't know what a litter bin is, let alone what recycling is. The amount of plastic that I am personally responsible for not being disposed of properly in my entire life is probably about 100g if that.
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Interesting thought. I would have said me too, but since I've been told that washing a fleece causes a lot of microplastics to end up in the environment and so does scouring powder I started to think what else I was overlooking. At least I don't have artificial grass.
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Microplastics shedding from clothing during washing is an interesting issue. However this is not a plastic bag at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, or the floating plastic garbage island in the middle of the Pacific. This are directly caused by dirty filthy people disposing of rubbish by just randomly throwing it away when they no longer need it.
As regards microplastic shedding from clothes, the bulk of my clothing is natural fibres to start with. I also expect to find washing machines come with appropriate
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Once Waterlogged it becomes heavier then water. Because it is more the air bubbles in the plastic in it that makes it float, the plastic itself is heavier then water.
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Polyethelene is less dense than water so if it's clean and empty then it will float. However an item in the bag or even a bit of sand washed inside could easilly push it over the edge into sinking.
Look, that sea cucumber paid 5p for that carrier bag from Tesco, he'll be dammed if he has to spend another 5p for a new one when he goes back.
Re: Why? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: Why? (Score:4, Funny)
African or European?
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This particular plastic bag is not a problem, because sitting on the bottom of the ocean means that it will eventually become petroleum once again.
What we need to find is a way of making the rest of the floating plastic sink to abyssal depths.
Re: Why? (Score:5, Interesting)
This particular plastic bag is not a problem, because sitting on the bottom of the ocean means that it will eventually become petroleum once again.
What we need to find is a way of making the rest of the floating plastic sink to abyssal depths.
Submarines compact their trash (along with weights) and deliberately send it to the ocean depths.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
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Not a terrible idea. Safety issues could be taken care of with an unmanned delivery system. There are already geothermal plants near volcanoes.
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Not a terrible idea. Safety issues could be taken care of with an unmanned delivery system. There are already geothermal plants near volcanoes.
A whole new market! The volcano waste disposal trebuchet.
Re: Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
While the volcano is busy breaking down the plastic to elements, it'll still release a lot of those half-broken molecules as debris and ash, many of which will float on the air over to populated areas. In Hawaii, those areas are also the places that bring in that lovely tourist revenue.
You're essentially suggesting we use a volcano as an incinerator, without bothering to put any filtration or scrubbers on the exhaust. Granted, the heavy stuff will be completely destroyed... but the lighter stuff will be just as bad as any other incineration. It might be possible to capture the released gas and try to filter it, but I suspect the higher heat of the volcano will make building such a structure rather difficult.
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Volcanoes aren't good at this stuff. They're not sucking stuff in down deep where they can be incinerated with high efficiency. Lava is essentially rock. Well rock with lots of gas actually, but it's still rock. So it's dense. If you drop a bunch of trash into lava it will be on the surface of the lava, because most of it is less dense than the lava. Gollum, as it turns out, isn't going to sink into the lava.
As it burns, it creates a crust of partially burnt garbage on top of a crust of now cooler lava.
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This would be ideal for certain types of nuclear waste as well. Not the partially used rods and pellets of nuclear fuel mind you. If we ever smarten up and finally start building thorium reactors, the rods and pellets from uranium fission plants can easily be fully consumed in a thorium molten salts reactor. I read somewhere that used fuel rods or pellets are barely used up in terms of reactivity when they are removed from use. (which is why they get sequestered in cooling ponds for so long)
The residual radioactivity is mostly from fission products and not the original fuel so presumably the fuel would be reprocessed chemically to separate the majority of the remaining fuel from the minority of the fission products and the dangerous fission products would be impaled into the crust entering the seduction zone with something like a steel and concrete dart.
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I think it would be better; although much more expensive to implement, to drop waste into an active subduction zone. Doing so would pull the waste down into the mantle, not only effectively breaking it down, but also trapping everything at the same time. This would be ideal for certain types of nuclear waste as well. Not the partially used rods and pellets of nuclear fuel mind you. If we ever smarten up and finally start building thorium reactors, the rods and pellets from uranium fission plants can easily be fully consumed in a thorium molten salts reactor. I read somewhere that used fuel rods or pellets are barely used up in terms of reactivity when they are removed from use. (which is why they get sequestered in cooling ponds for so long)
Along the same lines other, things we can't recycle today might well be recyclable in the near future. For the numerous rare earths used in electronics particularly, I can easily believe that a process can be developed that is more cost efficient as a source of rare earths than mining for new supplies. Viewed as ore, most electronics are actually richer sources of rare earths than the native ores they came from. In that light, any disposal method that leaves the elements inside basically irretrievable would short sighted,
Boy I wish I had points right now. This one deserves lots. Best comment I have read in a while!
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Nope, you need to go down to the southern hemisphere where hurricanes go backwards and the volcanoes suck molten lava back into the Earth. That's where you send all the trash.
Or there is this really deep trench I've been hearing about...
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You can't remember what doesn't exist.
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"You can't remember what doesn't exist."
You are going to call me out on the garbage island (which yes, is just a higher concentration of plastic particulates that can't be seen by the naked eye...) but you are going to let the Cthulhu aliens go unchallenged.
It can mean only one thing ... yaji'u ash-shudhdhadh
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Well, at least it was an *American* bag!
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Well, at least it was an *American* bag!
are you sure? if it was green with a yellow flower on it, then I am pretty sure it is a european bag. On the other hand if it had a picture of Trump then it is clearly an american bag :-)
Re:Why? (Score:5, Funny)
But if you thought the trench could escape the global onslaught of plastics pollution, you would be wrong.
Why would I, or anyone, think that?
You wouldn't. But the story sounds more sensational if it's implied somebody would.
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But if you thought the trench could escape the global onslaught of plastics pollution, you would be wrong.
Why would I, or anyone, think that?
You wouldn't. But the story sounds more sensational if it's implied somebody would.
Ah ... it all makes sense now.
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People will tell themselves whatever they can to help them sleep at night, knowing that they bought their comfort and convenience by polluting everyone else's world, to keep themselves from accepting responsibility and changing.
You can consume less plastic. You can start now.
Re:Why? (Score:4, Insightful)
You can consume less plastic. You can start now.
I started back in 2012, when my city, San Jose CA, banned single-use plastic bags.
Hawaii bans bags statewide.
Kenya, Uganda, and Rwanda ban bags.
China doesn't ban bags, but they cannot be free. Shops have to charge extra for them, which greatly decreases their use.
Re:Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Humans are very prone to magical thinking about even the most practical matters. For example, a small but meaningful fraction of the world population thinks that their fossil CO2 emissions magically don't contribute to climate change.
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Humans are very prone to magical thinking about even the most practical matters. For example, a small but meaningful fraction of the world population thinks that their fossil CO2 emissions magically don't contribute to climate change.
Excepting the 46.4% of the American electorate who thinks it's a Chinese hoax because their dear leader said so.
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Re:Why? (Score:5, Funny)
"I never understood why people thought this was funny, Chewbacca doesn't live on Endor."
I mean, i don't think its the greatest joke ever told. But whether or not Chewbacca does or does not live on Endor is completely irrelevant. I mean you realize that right? To call that error out, to suggest THAT is the sticking point for you??? --- because what? If Chewbacca DID live on Endor then this argument would have somehow worked ?
The fact the idiots hearing the argument were convinced by an utter nonsense argument was the joke.
The fact that, no Chewbacca doesn't even live on Endor is an inside joke for star wars nerds on top of that; because anyone who only saw RotJ once back in the 80s and doesn't remember it scene by scene could well accept that premise that Chewbacca was from Endor too -- but it doesn't even matter whether its true or not; its just the icing on the cake.
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The fact that, no Chewbacca doesn't even live on Endor is an inside joke for star wars nerds on top of that; because anyone who only saw RotJ once back in the 80s and doesn't remember it scene by scene could well accept that premise that Chewbacca was from Endor too -- but it doesn't even matter whether its true or not; its just the icing on the cake.
To be a true Star Wars nerd you would understand that originally the Wookies were meant to live on Endor but Lucas liked them so much he created the character Chewbacca to be in all 3 films and the Ewoks to fill the role of the original Wookies, hence the names are similar.
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It is an example of a style of humor known as non sequitur [wikipedia.org]
This is also a logical fallacy in which an deduction doesn't actually follow from the premises. It happens a lot in arguments of law.
So, the whole Chewbaca defense thing is a demonstration of the non sequitur fallacy in the style of non sequitur humor.
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If this is the problem you have with the Chewbacca defense, it worked.
Gravity works! (Score:3, Informative)
That's the important takeaway here. Even at crushing depths and pressures, gravity will still pull a plastic bag all the way to the bottom.
Gravity is only a theory ! (Score:3)
But gravity, it's only a theory [ncse.com] !
Teach the controversy!
#IntelligentFalling
---
(Sorry couldn't resist to make the joke)
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Re:Gravity works! (Score:4, Insightful)
I think at those depths, buoyancy and currents has much more forces on the bag than gravity. Even above water a plastic bag is quickly overtaken by those.
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Gravity finds a way.
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Buoyancy is a consequence of gravity applied to fluids.
Did you pick it up? (Score:2, Insightful)
Probably like most people they commented about it but left it there for someone else to deal with.
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Probably like most people they commented about it but left it there for someone else to deal with.
Nope, no more than the actress who played Gloria gave the starving kid her sandwich.
(I kid ... maybe she gave the kid her sandwich. I really don't know ...)
that should make (Score:4, Funny)
taking samples much easier since paper bags would get waterlogged and tear.
How long? (Score:1)
Will it take to fill the trench?
Re:How long? (Score:5, Insightful)
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...which is about 3.7 billion years of plastic bag consumption at present-day rates [theworldcounts.com], if we deliver each one to the trench, and if you assume no biodegradation which does become a factor on such a timescale (especially if a plastic-eating bacteria were to escape the lab).
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Larn sumpin ever day (Score:2)
My personal edification proceeded in the following increments:
1. There is a data base of undersea debris.
2. We have submersibles that can operate and take photos at 36,000' down. And for 30 years?
What I didn't learn is that there are artifacts down there. And regardless of the buoyancy/density of plastic material and how it changes under descent it would make sense it could be dragged down by something it was containing. I am sure you can find human made items down there from hundreds of year ago.
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We can find a plastic bag but not a crashed airplane?
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We weren't looking for a particular bag.
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I know. I just thinking this can replace the old "We can send a man to space..." line.
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Yeah, I keep finding crashed planes underwater, just not the one in particular I want.
It's hard to go shopped on the second hand market these days... did any of the planes have plastic bags in them? Maybe some towels?
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Maybe the bag was from a crashed airplane! Conspiracy theorists: GO!
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Maybe the bag was from a crashed airplane! Conspiracy theorists: GO!
Ok.... Let's see.... The airplane was removed by the aliens allied with the illuminati so that we would not guess that the bag was from a secret illuminati aircraft. All this is just a cover up to hide the fact that the aircraft was a disguised weather ballon similar to the one from roswell. And that is a cover up to hide the fact that the illuminati is trying to make everybody think that the price of plastic bags should go up in order for them to secretly earn extra cash by selling more expensive plastic
Hope (Score:4)
I've been looking all over for my Zune receipt. Is it in that bag?
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I've been looking all over for my Zune receipt. Is it in that bag?
No, but we found your Zune next to it on the sea floor and it worked fine when we tried it.
mod parent up (Score:2)
Its already a natural landfill. Let's just continue that, it can probably hold all of our plastic waste.
If I had mod points right now I'd give that an "insightful". Oceanic trenches ARE the planet's landfill, sucking the seabottom debris under the mantle, to be melted and perhaps eventually released via volcanism.
(They'd be a GREAT place to dispose of radioactive waste if one could be sure it wouldn't get loose before being sucked under.)
Re:mod parent up (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't remember who thought it up but that is actually one of the safest possible ways to dispose of a lot of nuclear waste. The plan was to mix the waste in with glass, temper and mold it into a big torpedo looking thing and drop it from a surface ship into the ocean sediment at a subduction zone. Such an object would bury its self deep in the sediments which should prevent it from posing a radiation risk to anything alive in the vicinity. Over the eons it would end up encased in sedimentary rock, and then eventually melted into the mantle. By the time it might resurface it should be so diluted and decayed as to pose no discernible risk to any people that might be left around. We don't do it apparently because of international treaties which generally ban disposing of nuclear waste in the oceans.
Age of Plastic (Score:5, Insightful)
I wonder how long some of this plastic will survive? It's going to be weird when millions of years from now, our layer in the geologic records is marked by plastics, chemicals and a mass extinction.
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won't be any different than the age when grocery stores handed out bags made of iridium.
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Really long in this case. There is no sunlight to break it down. Only a volcanic or a chemical reaction could do the deed at the depth, and the sparse marine life if it's unlucky.
well size DOES matter
Relevance (Score:1)
At what point does this not matter? If it were a hypothetical trench at the bottom of the world's deepest ocean? Or if it were on an exoplanet ?
You can find trash everywhere, but in some places you can't even find traces of significance.
Re:Relevance (Score:5, Insightful)
Finding plastic bags in the underwater trenches of an exoplanet would actually be fairly remarkable on a number of fronts.
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But on your death bed are you going to look back and say, "Ah ! I know whether exoplanets have trash in their underwater trenches! It was all worth it!"
If not, then
Which grocery store? (Score:3, Funny)
Because their delivery service is AWESOME!
Brand shaming (Score:2)
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Found an article with the purported bag: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/ne... [telegraph.co.uk]
I wouldn't immediately have recognized it as a plastic bag. Looks more like a Zune receipt.
Carlin's paradigm proven (Score:2)
The Earth + Plastic is now scientifically proven. When does George Carlin get his posthumous Nobel Prize?
You just tell me how ... (Score:2)
the poor, hard working octopus dad is going to get supper home to the kids without a plastic bag? You use them so why should these critters not do as well? :-)
Obligatory xkcd quotes! (Score:3)
Hey! That was my lunch! (Score:2)
Great (Score:1)
Fake News? (Score:2)
The video in the linked article, on the National Geographic web site, does NOT show a plastic bag. It shows a diver collecting 2L plastic soda bottles, but no plastic bag. (Except for the very large sample collection bag that he brought.)
The diver appears to be using conventional SCUBA gear. Can you even dive in the Mariana Trench that way? He's in a regular wet suit, bare handed, etc. I thought that going deeper than about 200 feet required more sophisticated gear. And I thought you could only go abou
Why I do not use plastic bags. (Score:2)
I do not like using plastic bags but not because of environmental concerns with their disposal; I prefer paper bags because I hate trees.
Panicking without Taking Responsibility (Score:1)
Re:Paper. (Score:4, Insightful)
Like... whatever happened to the paper bags we used to get out groceries in? You know, environmentally friendly, renewable, cheap, QUICKLY biodegradable, strong, reusable paper bags.
Those paper bags are still there, in every supermarket. You just have to ask for them.
Re:Paper. (Score:5, Informative)
Not at the supermarkets where I live. Plastic or carry it yourself. I bring my own cloth reusable bags.
I really hate how this world has gone plastic crazy, plastic bags and bottles. I would much rather us return to paper bags and glass bottles. To me drinks just taste better out of glass bottles. An glass is infinity recycle. An even if glass gets in the environment it is not as big a deal as plastic. Glass will eventually get broken down into is components, sand, much more quickly than plastic.
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Glass will eventually get broken down into is components, sand, much more quickly than plastic.
I don't think that's accurate. I haven't checked, but I know it's common to find very very old glass buried places and in wonderful condition. On the other hand, I've seen plastic bags of trash almost completely disappear from rot and other stuff tearing it apart.
Totally agree otherwise.
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On the other hand, I've seen plastic bags of trash almost completely disappear from rot and other stuff tearing it apart.
Just because you can't see it, doesn't mean its gone. Plastic molecules don't degrade so easy. They are finding molecules of plastic in soil bacteria. The longevity of some of the most dense plastics is measured in thousands of years. Glass exposed to the environment will eventually get broken down. Even glass on beaches will eventually be taken care of over time.
Some plastics are also poisonous, pure glass isn't.
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I just read an article where some glass in the right conditions can last a million years. That condition being a landfill. That is actually pretty cool. I had no ideal that glass could last that long before breaking down.
But those where perfectly stable conditions. I still think that glass in the environment will break down a lot faster.
On another note. Does anyone else feel that in the future we will be mining our current landfills for valuable resources? So much shit we have tossed into landfi
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Like... whatever happened to the paper bags we used to get out groceries in? You know, environmentally friendly, renewable, cheap, QUICKLY biodegradable, strong, reusable paper bags.
Those paper bags are still there, in every supermarket. You just have to ask for them.
Paper bags are almost exclusively an American thing and aren't as environmentally friendly as you think because they are rarely made from recycled materials and often end up in landfills.
They're also terrible as carrier bags because they lack handles and have the arse fall out of them when wet (it rains a lot here in the UK). I'm a one trip kind of guy, that means I carry everything from the checkout to my car in one go, I presently do that with 2 large reusable bags.
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Our bags have handles and compost down just fine in landfills.
And yes, I remember rain.
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Our bags have handles and compost down just fine in landfills.
And yes, I remember rain.
And the trees cut down to make new ones? I highly doubt they're from 100% sustainable sources.
The other problem with paper bags is that they aren't reusable. Here in the UK they've introduced a bag charge which has cut down on plastic waste significantly. Like I said, I have large reusable bags that I've had since I moved to the UK over 2 years ago. These two bags have literally saved me from using hundreds of bags (each weekly shop using 3-5 normal carrier bags, over 104 weeks, that's 312-520 bags). The
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The paper bag may not be reusable once you have filled it with trash, but because they are made from trees, the usage is sustainable. Here in the US when we cut down a tree, we grow new ones to replace it. I know that in the UK after the trees were logged off, you just left the hills bare (I have hiked across it). That's why since you converted the Drax power plant in Yorkshire from coal to wood, you have had to burn American firewood in it, thereby allowing you to classify the plant as a sustainable operat
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Because we had to think of the trees! When did you ever see a beautiful plastic bush? Nobody wants to save those! Also, it costs less for a stack of more bags, which saves even more money by not needing to bring more bags to the register as often.
I prefer cloth bags for grocery shopping anyhow, because I would rather not have the temptation to save a bunch of crappy little plastic bags. Those things just love to rip once you try to use them for anything serious.