http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/general/sixminute/2010/02/100218_6min_plastic_page.shtml
Rubbish, or garbage, or litter
Write about plastic pollution
Notes:
The structure:
Identify the problem
Give examples and facts
Provide solutions
Examples and facts
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/04/23/oprah-shines-light-on-gre_n_190552.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/10/science/10patch.html?_r=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uLrVCI4N67M
Plastic pollution
ReplyDeletePlastic pollution is one of the biggest problems which the world and especially the Pacific Ocean have to handle with.
Pollution means harmful waste which is put out in the environment and damages plants and animals.
In 1997, there was discovered the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a place in the ocean of a 600,000 square miles where millions of plastics are floating around.
It stretches out from the coast of California to Japan and it is 90 feet deep.
In fact, it is a big floating soup with garbage that destroys sea life and kills millions of sea animals and this garbage patch is as big as twice the size of France.
Plastic pollution does not only kill millions of sea animals, the animals also eat plastics and environmental activists found pieces of bottles, children’s toys and fishing nets in sea birds’ stomachs.
The floating plastic moreover destroys plankton, the food of nearly every fish in the ocean.
There are five million tons of floating trash which means 46,000 pieces of plastic on each square kilometer of the Garbage Patch.
One has to keep in mind that 80% of the plastic garbage in the ocean comes from land; it is thrown away by humans.
Most of the garbage produced by humans is not biodegradable and some of the plastic pieces can last over 1000 years in nature.
There is a worldwide production of 100,000,000 million tons of plastic each year and 40% of these plastics are used as packaging materials.
Packaging materials are the worst plastics worldwide because they are only used once and then discarded.
Changing our behavior is the only solution for this problem.
We have to recycle plastic products. Recycling is a process of turning used materials into new materials.
London owns a great example of a recycling system.
You have to store your garbage in front of your house and then it gets disposed by the government to beware of pollution of nature.
Moreover, we have to reduce waste, reduce packaging materials and recycle all kinds of plastic products.
If you are not able to recycle your garbage, you should use packaging materials again.
Pollution
ReplyDeleteIn the dialogue of Kate and Dan they are talking about plastic pollution on plants. Pollution with plastic is damaging the environment, especially plants and animals. Harmful waste is everywhere in the ocean and it comes from the land.
In the Great pacific garbage patch discovered in the year 1997 is an area of the Pacific Ocean where a lot of garbage is collected. More than 600.000 square miles are full of plastic garbage, which is the size of France. 80 percent of this rubbish comes from land; the other 20 percent are from fishing boats.
100.000s of thousands Sea birds, mammals and turtles are killed by this pollution in the Ocean. Many bird species that are dead have liter in their stomachs, any sort of plastic that is flowing around in the Ocean. There are Fishing nets and ropes, but also things that come from land.
Most plastics aren’t biodegradable. That means it does not break down naturally, which is not good for our environment, because it lasts much longer in the Ocean. Some plastic bags could exist in the ocean more that a thousand years. 100 millions of tons are made every year and exactly his rubbish is used and discarded by people.
3 R’s are important for us to know how plastic pollution could be stopped or reduced. Reducing garbage, reuse for example bottles or even recycles any sort of plastic, whether burn or waste, like old glass, paper and plastic. One could make something new.
London has a great recycle program: People collect their garbage and Employees of London take it with them and dispose it. People should first reduce and/ or reuse the things they are using! That could be the first step into a future without plastic pollution, or more or less little pollution.
It is interesting to know that 46.000 pieces of plastic are in every square meter in the Ocean, which is a lot more than some people could imagine. If we all are going to reuse and recycle our garbage and do something for our environment, we could do much better.
Subject: Plastic
ReplyDeletePollution is the term for waste which is put into the environment and is manmade. This garbage damages plants and animals.
The Great Pacific Garbage Patch was discovered in 1989 and is an area of the Pacific Ocean. In some of these areas are even more plastic than plants. The average of plastic is 46,000 pieces in each square kilometer in this area and has the size of 600,000 square miles across.
This kind of pollution is non-biodegradable, which means it does not break down naturally. Furthermore, it kills all kind of sea organisms like sea birds, sea animals, coral banks and turtles. The ecosystem is going to break down and leads to sea animals, which were grown in a plastic ring or albatross eating plastic, for example. Nevertheless, this also leads to extinction of animals and coral banks.
100 million tones of plastic products are made every year and referring to pollution, 80% of this garbage comes from land. Beside this garbage, there is a lot of pollution caused by fishing.
Nowadays, 40% of the produced plastic is used for packaging.
So, many countries use the following solution in order to cut down the usage of plastic.
The so-called “3 R’s”:
1. Reduce:
We have the possibility to reduce the use of plastic, especially for packaging. If we have not the possibility to reduce then
2. Re-use:
We should look after to use “re-useable” packaging and plastics. If we cannot re-use those products anymore, we should try to
3. Recycle:
Recycling has different ways of meaning, such as burning, melting and pryolysing them for energy. Another opportunity is to process them in China for clothes and other products.
According to this 3 R we have the possibility to avoid pollution and save the environment. It is important to work out international terms of saving the environment and especially our oceans. Furthermore, the controlling of pollution should be more strict and punished harder.
Short summary about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch:
ReplyDeleteMankind is producing a lot of plastic litter and a huge part of it doesn't get recycled but thrown away nearly everywhere. As most plastic isn't biodegradable this waste stays in the environment for a long time.
Many plastic particles are floating around on our oceans forming big floating polymer carpets. The largest accumulation is the so called Great Pacific Garbage Patch that is located in the northern Pacific Ocean. It's exact size is unknown but estimations range between the size of Texas and the whole continental US.
Scientist estimate that in each square kilometer there are about 5kg of plastic garbage particles (of all sizes) floating on the water surface. And even more polymer particles have sunk to the ground.
The most obvious hazards for marine life are choking and ingestion of plastic particles that may cause external and internal injuries. But there are other dangers that are less obvious. Some polymers are toxic on their own. Other polymers accumulate poisons during their stay in the oceans. This can lead to growth and reproduction disturbances on marine wildlife. And as man is part of nature and the end of many food changes – human health may also be affected.
Measures against this kind of pollution are currently the prohibition for ships to dump their waste directly to the sea, efforts to keep the rivers cleaner and more use of 100% biodegradable materials instead of conventional polymers.
Titel: Plastic in our world
ReplyDeleteThe initial action for this article based on a discussion about our "Plastic planet" from the bbc webside "learning englisch".
Two people discuss on this web side about the plastic pollution of the whole world.
Not only within the "known" areas like our towns or pollution collection outside the towns, also within the world oceans.
The discussion explain the exists of the so called "Great Pacific Garbage Patch" in the pacific ocean, which was discovered in 1999. The contaminied area is much bigger than the size of France. In this GPGP there exists up to 6 time more plastic pieces than plankton.
Outside of this GPGP we can found more than 46000 pieces of plastic in every qkm of water.
This plastic pieces comes in the main part (more than 80%) from the land, and only 20% are the rest of plastic ropes, fishing nets and so on.
The main problem of these plastic pieces are
- not biodegradable. This means the this plastic pieces exists for a long long time in the future (There exists no bacteriums to break open the material to the basic material components).
- Animals eats the plastic pieces and die. The plastic can't stomach from the animals.
The science assume the dead of more than one million sea birds and 100.000 mammals animals every year. In my opinon no approval about the dead fishs exists.
The solution for our plastic problems can be solved with the 3 R's:
- Reduce
- Reuse
- Recycle
Reduce the plastic are possible in a easy way for each people: Don't use so much plastic packaging materials.
This is the easiest way, because more than 40% from the fabricate plastic material (overall 100 Mio tons every year) was packaging material.
Another problem is the circumstance, that petroleum as basic material from plastic is a limited resource on the world and to valuable for fabricate only one-way-packaging material.
Reusing means: use the same things more than once. By example using water bottles instead on pn-way-bottles. Or use plastic bags more than only one time.
Recyling derscribe the "reusing" of plastic material based on the basic material components. Old plastic can melt down and create new plastic objects from this (best sample are reusing our plastic bottles within new clothes). Burning of old plastic are also labeld as Recycling (better than throw away).
Note: The three R's are not only the solution for our plastic waste, also for other materials like glas or metal (very easy to reuse).
Bernd
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ReplyDeleteIssue: Plastic pollution
ReplyDeletePollution in general is one of the world’s biggest problems. But this big problem has to be divided in its detailed fragments to understand the immense extent of it. This article should sum up the key points about the special problem of plastic pollution in oceans, based on the BBC video called “Plastic world.”
Before giving information about the problem of the plastic pollution and the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, it is necessary to know what pollution is.
Pollution is harmful waste which is put into the environment and damages plants and animals.
This definition shows the problem! Pollution is not natural; it is caused by human and damages our Planet.
According to this problem, the BBC video names an example called the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch”. The GPGP is an area in the Pacific Ocean in which plastic rubbish is collected since 1997. This area is about 600.000m2 big and has the size of twice France. Furthermore, this area is contaminated with plastic garbage which comes actually from land and floated in the sea.
Some key facts show the enormous damage caused in this region. The GDPG contains up to 6 times more plastic pieces than plankton. According to the United Nations (UN) the total amount of plastic in this area is about 46.000 different pieces per sqm of water, and the pollution kills over hundreds of thousands mammals and animals every year.
The sad thing about it is, that more than 80% of the litter come from land and floated in this region. Another 20% are fishing garbage like plastic ropes, fishing nets, etc.
The figures of land caused plastic pollution are so immense because of its use. 40% of the world’s plastic pollution is used for packaging (discard), and instead of throwing the package in the garbage, people throw in nature or in the sea.
This misbehavior leads to several problems. On the one hand plastic litter is not biodegradable, which means that plastic not biological resolves in its main parts and exists for a long time. You can only try to collect it. On the other hand, the pieces of plastic are so small that animals eat them and die.
Because the problem is getting worst, solutions are necessary. A possible solution is the 3’R model
- Reduce
- Re-use
- Recycle
This model provides solutions in a fixed order. The easiest way would be to reduce the use of plastic. If you cannot reduce your use of plastic try to re-use it. For example, this means cleaning a plastic bottle and re-using it before throwing it into the garbage, nature or sea. If you cannot reduce or re-use your plastic consume than try to recycle it. Recycling means melting plastic and re-using its components. The 3 R’s model would not only be a solution to the plastic pollution in the sea, it also would be effective referring to glass or metal waste.
To put in a nutshell, plastic pollution is caused by human, so it is the human who has to change its behavior. Otherwise we cannot stop the catastrophe!