Spotlight: Marine Debris – As Ocean Art

“Water and air, the two essential fluids on which all life depends, have become global garbage cans.” ~ Jacques Yves Cousteau Garbage in our oceans. It's a huge problem. Marine debris comes in all forms, and is alarmingly plastic. It's impossible to fully quantify the scope of the problem. A year ago, National Geographic estimated …

Pic o’ the Week: What Lies Under

"Just because you can't see it doesn't mean it isn't there." A nice graphic reminder for us by Indonesia-based digital artist Ferdi Rizkiyanto. Find groups and people working to cut down on ocean pollution and debris - here on our plastic/marine debris Twitter list. And give up, as much as you can, single-use bags, bottles and …

Notable Ocean Quotable: plastic bags

“There is no reason a product we use for a few minutes should float in our oceans for a few hundred years.” --Dave Mathews of Environment Oregon After the state legislature failed to take decisive action to reduce Oregonians' use of single-use plastic bags, a mosaic of activists, conservationists and just plain sensible people are working …

Unified Command: BP “cannot remember” when dispersant last used

We checked in with the Unified Command press shop today, to verify that BP still is applying no dispersants in the Gulf. The staffer told us that no dispersants have been applied sub-sea since July 15. This jives with their response to us last week. However, the staffer (same one we talked to before - …

BP has stopped using dispersants in the Gulf – for now

We've crunched the numbers from the Deepwater Horizon Unified Command press shop, compiling their daily stats for dispersants used in the Gulf of Mexico so far - and the official dispersant numbers for the past week are surprising: According to official releases, a "very small" amount of  dispersants have been used in the oil spill response …

Sea turtle hatchlings LOVE beach resort lights

There's bound to be messiness when creatures who've roamed the seas and beaches for millions of years face the relatively newfangled phenomenon of artifical light. Scientists believe that sea turtle hatchlings, when they emerge from their shells on beaches around the world, institnctually move in the direction where the sky is brightest. On a beach …

gushing oil, chemical dispersants and sealife

Video released by the Deepwater Horizon Response team from the oil leak site shows the sheer volume of crude spraying into the deep sea 24/7 (visible especially starting at 1:58) And we got word from the EPA yesterday that it has approved further use of chemical dispersants, both on the surface and underwater, even though …

greening surfboards

Many surfers tend to be concerned about our oceans' health - they spend  a lot of time immersed in their waters, after all. That their sole piece of sporting equipment - the surfboard - is made of a brew of chemicals, including petroleum-based foam, polyester resins and chemically treated fiberglass, has long been what reporter …

cruises and oceans – high impact

Caribbean countries showed their sea some love this week by banning the dumping of all garbage at sea. As one UN consultant working on the pact said, "It's a big deal." And it's been a long time coming - the ban was established,  for all intents and purposes, in 1993. But it's taken until 2010 …

Santa Cruz battles bags – DC already did

Santa Cruz County supervisors voted today to ban retail establishments from giving customers plastic bags. It looks like the ordinance probably won't take effect for a year, will cost the county at least $100,000 for an environmental study, and won't apply to retailers in incorporated cities. But it's a step in the right direction. Plastics, …