The Ocean Garbage Patch Is Mysteriously Disappearing

[xchrom]

http://www.businessinsider.com/the-ocean-garbage-is-mysteriously-dissapearing-2014-7



A vast amount of the plastic garbage littering the surface of the ocean may be disappearing, a new study suggests.
Exactly what is happening to this ocean debris is a mystery, though the researchers hypothesize that the trash could be breaking down into tiny, undetectable pieces. Alternatively, the garbage may be traveling deep into the ocean's interior.

"The deep ocean is a great unknown," study co-author Andrés Cózar, an ecologist at the University of Cadiz in Spain, said in an email. "Sadly, the accumulation of plastic in the deep ocean would be modifying this mysterious ecosystem — the largest of the world — before we can know it."

Researchers drew their conclusion about the disappearing trash by analyzing the amount of plastic debris floating in the ocean, as well as global plastic production and disposal rates.



Read more: http://www.livescience.com/46598-ocean-plastic-is-missing.html#ixzz36CmMwu6k

[madokie]

1. There isn't but one place for it to go

Shouldn't be much speculation on that one.

[IronLionZion]

2. I think its been breaking down into smaller and smaller fragments

Now, that’s strange. Larger pieces of plastic usual break into tiny pieces of debris, but the majority of the small plastic fragments were missing, according to the study. That leaves four main possibilities as to what’s happening to the debris.

Fish may be eating it. If that’s the case, the tiny plastic particles are entering the “global ocean food web”, as noted by Science Magazine. Humans are a part of that food web, too.

The Spanish researcher also suggest the debris is being broken into even tinier pieces — “nanofragments” — that are impossible to detect and may have an unknown impact on the ocean environment. Or perhaps it’s being washed up and deposited on shore — though it’s “unlikely” that this would happen just to these tiny pieces, the academics say.

Best-case scenario? The garbage could simply just be sinking into the deep ocean, which means less wildlife comes into contact with the plastic pieces.
http://blogs.marketwatch.com/themargin/2014/07/01/its-a-mystery-where-has-99-of-the-oceans-trash-gone/

Ocean currents and storms and pressure and whatnot can be very powerful and plastic is quite weak.

[NickB79]

3. Or a microorgansim has evolved that can digest plastics

Which could be a really, really bad thing for human civilization if it was uncontrolled.

[XemaSab]

4. .

[defacto7]

5. So many ways to title

or interpret the same studies....

Plastic debris contaminates 88 percent of ocean’s surface, report says

also:

The report, titled “Global Warming Releases Microplastic Legacy Frozen in Arctic Sea Ice,” said ice in some remote locations contains at least twice as much plastic as previously reported areas of surface water such as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch – an area of plastic waste estimated to be bigger than the state of Texas.

Arctic ice melt to release 1 trillion pieces of plastic into sea