The Great Garbage Patch — Time to Think Beyond Plastic

by

Charmaine Coimbra

You ask, “How bad is this Great Garbage Patch in the Pacific Gyre?”

It’s still a work in study, with a nightmarish bit of data already published.  According to a recent report from the Center for Ocean Solutions–a collaboration between Stanford University, including the Hopkins Marine Station, the Monterey Bay Aquarium and the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute–a group of 30 scientists from around the Pacific reviewed more than 3,400 scientific articles and reports regarding the Pacific Ocean, “…the most pervasive and serious threats…(are) pollution …(including) plastic marine debris…habitat destruction…overfishing and exploitation…(and) climate change (from) Carbon dioxide (CO2) discharged to the atmosphere…”

The report is available at www.centerforoceansolution.org/initiatives_poi.html

Plastics in Great Garbage Patch from http://www.greatgarbagepatch.org/

The Great Garbage Patch is the subject of this blog.

Sea Studios Foundation in Monterey, Ca (www.seastudios.org) recently explained, “(The Great Garbage Patch)… is roughly the size of Texas, containing approximately 3.5 million tons of trash.  Shoes, toys, bags, pacifiers, wrappers, toothbrushes, and bottles too numerous to count are only part of what can be found in this accidental dump floating midway between Hawaii and San Francisco.”

Visit http://www.greatgarbagepatch.org/

Why is the trash there?

David Robinson, captain of the marine research vessel Derek M Baylis, and managing director of Sea Life Conservation (www.sealifeconservation.org), gave the most direct and simple explanation last night in Morro Bay, CA,  “Because the ocean is downhill from everywhere.”

While the shipping industry is a secondary source of trash in the ocean, the main source is you and I—including our demand from the plastics industry, that also loses nurdles (tiny round plastic bits that make plastic toys–see  http://neptune911.wordpress.com/2009/08/18/mermaid-tears-another-nautical-disaster/ ) into the sea.

Consider a big event, like a tornado ripping through the Midwestern US, spewing tons of trash along creeks that drain into tributary rivers, that drain into, say, the Mississippi River, that drains into the Gulf of Mexico.  Consider the winds along San Francisco Bay that catch a loose plastic bag, and a runaway plastic cup that continue their downhill plight into the Pacific Ocean. Consider an earthquake and a resulting tsunami along Indonesia that uproots more debris, and then with a few swift destructive waves, pulls more waste into the Pacific.  Consider the abandoned plastic toys that get caught in an El Nino year flood somewhere in Washington State, that floats downhill, and eventually into Puget Sound, and out into the sea.

I think of the wind that grabbed an empty plastic bag that I reused for lunch, right out from my car when I opened the door.  I chased the bag until the wind flipped it into the air and over a fence, and out of reach, and then free to float into the open sea.  Multiply this seemingly minor accident by the millions of people who live along the Pacific Coast—both east and west.  And suddenly we find ourselves Googleing a map of Texas as we try to conceptualize trash inundating those state boundaries. 

Then someone asks what’s the problem with that, because the trash is out in the middle of nowhere? The old out of sight out of mind scenario.

I’m going to let Captain Charles Moore, who discovered this garbage patch explain in this video:

Robinson simplified this issue of why the plastic in the Great Garbage Patch is important, “It’s now a part of our food chain.”   Aside from the fish that have consumed plastic #7, for instance, a polycarbonate plastic used for clear plastic “sippy” cups, electronics, medical storage containers, 5-gallon water bottles, and “sport” water bottles, we eventually consume the fish.  The health effects of polycarbonate plastic include the leaching of bisphenol A (BPA), a known endocrine disruptor.

Here’s how the scientific community views BPA http://www.ehponline.org/realfiles/members/2004/7534/7534.html

“By mimicking the action of the hormone, estrogen, bisphenol A has been found to: effect the development of young animals; play a role in certain types of cancer; create genetic damage and behavioral changes in a variety of species. Bisphenol A is widespread–one study found BPA in 95% of American adults sampled.”  (Italics, mine.)

If that statement doesn’t catch your attention, then go ahead and just make yourself a BPA and banana smoothie and get the suffering over with quickly.

This is a challenge that is best met by stopping the over-use of plastics now.  Like Robinson said last night, “I don’t hate plastics.  My helmet for cycling is plastic and it’s good.  But plastic when utilized for a moment (like take out containers, Styrofoam coffee cups, single serving food items—yogurt, juice drinks, etc.) is the problem.”   One momentary, single use item, like a polystyrene take out container, can last for 400 years.  When he was asked how do we fix this garbage patch dilemma, Robinson noted that repairing the ecological disaster is monumental, but “First, we have to stop the flow of plastic, ” meaning stop the plastic bags, stop the polystyrene single use containers, rethink your everyday dependence upon plastic and – try spending one day a week without plastic at all.

Note:  The Think Beyond Plastics Voyage  will next stop in Santa Barbara, Los Angeles, Long Beach, Newport Beach and San Diego.

For more information about plastic bags and plastics, see the accompanying Pages in this blog.

Toxic Algae Blooms Poison Marine Life and Seabirds

Killer Algae: Key Player In Mass Extinctions  

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091019134716.htm  

Editor’s Note:  A recent toxic algae bloom has caused the deaths of California Sea Lions along the Central Coast of California.  Neptune 911 is researching this local information and will report  our research results in the near future. 

 ScienceDaily (Oct. 20, 2009) — Supervolcanoes and cosmic impacts get all the terrible glory for causing mass extinctions, but a new theory suggests lowly algae may be the killer behind the world’s great species annihilations. 

Today, just about anywhere there is water, there can be toxic algae. The microscopic plants usually exist in small concentrations, but a sudden warming in the water or an injection of dust or sediment from land can trigger a bloom that kills thousands of fish, poisons shellfish, or even humans. 

 James Castle and John Rodgers of Clemson University think the same thing happened during the five largest mass extinctions in Earth’s history. Each time a large die off occurred, they found a spike in the number of fossil algae mats called stromatolites strewn around the plane…”If you go through theories of mass extinctions, there are always some unanswered questions,” Castle said. “For example, an impact – how does that cause species to go extinct? Is it climate change, dust in the atmosphere? It’s probably not going to kill off all these species on its own.” 

 But as the nutrient-rich fallout from the disaster lands in the water, it becomes food for algae. They explode in population, releasing chemicals that can act as anything from skin irritants to potent neurotoxins. Plants on land can pick up the compounds in their roots, and pass them on to herbivorous animals. 

 If the theory is right, it answers a lot of questions about how species died off in the ancient world. It also raises concerns for how today’s algae may damage the ecosystem in a warmer world. 

 ”Algae growth is favored by warmer temperatures,” Castle said. “You get accelerated metabolism and reproduction of these organisms, and the effect appears to be enhanced for species of toxin-producing cyanobacteria.” 

 He added that toxic algae in the United States appear to be migrating slowly northward through the country’s ponds and lakes, and along the coast as temperatures creep upward. Their expanding range portends a host of problems for fish and wildlife, but also for humans, as algae increasingly invade reservoirs and other sources of drinking water. 

Foam from ocean algae bloom killing thousands of birds  

By Lynne Terry, The Oregonian

 http://www.oregonlive.com/news/index.ssf/2009/10/foam_from_ocean_algae_bloom_ki.html 

 October 22, 2009, 7:36PM   

Red-Throated Loon Covered in Foam. P. Chilton Photo

A red-throated loon, covered in foam, lies in the sand near the Klipsan beach approach on the northern end of the Long Beach Peninsula. The bird was still alive when this photo was taken.A slimy foam churning up from the ocean has killed thousands seabirds and washed many others ashore, stripped of their waterproofing and struggling for life.

The birds have been clobbered by an unusual algae bloom stretching from the northern Oregon coast to the tip of the Olympic Peninsula in Washington state.

“This is huge,” said Julia Parrish, a marine biologist and professor at the University of Washington who leads a seabird monitoring group. “It’s the largest mortality event of its kind on the West Coast that we know of.”

The culprit is a single-cell algae or phytoplankton called Akashiwo sanguinea.  Though the algae has multiplied off the coast of California before, killing hundreds of seabirds, the phenomenon has not been seen in Oregon and Washington, and has never occurred on the West Coast to this extent, Parrish said.

“We’re getting counts of up to a million cells per liter of water,” she said. “Think about that. That’s pretty dense.”

Marine biologists said it is not clear why the algae are multiplying, though they do flourish in warm weather. Recent storms could have contributed to the problem, with crashing waves breaking them up. 

Helping the birds 

The Wildlife Center of the North Coast said it needs cash donations to buy fish to feed the birds, along with good used towels, large dog kennels to carry birds and bleach, as well as experienced volunteers. Contact the center via its Web site at www.coastwildlife.org or by mail at: Wildlife Center of the North Coast P.O. Box 1232 Astoria, OR 97103 The algae get whipped by the surf into something akin to a sticky soap that looks like the top of a root beer float. The foam can be deadly to seabirds because it washes off the natural oils that keep them waterproofed.

Without that protection, they get cold, wet, eventually dying of hypothermia.

When they wash ashore, they are covered in foam.

“It looks like they’re lying in a sea of bubble bath,” said Greg Schirato,  regional wildlife program manager for the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife. He said thousands had died.

This algal  bloom, unlike the toxins produced by blue-green algae, poses no threat to humans or pets. But the bloom could kill fish by clogging their gills, said Zachary Forster,  phytoplankton specialist at the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.

“We haven’t seen any instances of that,” Forster said.

The first seabird die-off in the Northwest occurred in mid-September, with swarms of dead and dying birds washing up on beaches around Kalaloch  on the Olympic Peninsula.

At least a thousand scoters, or sea ducks, were killed, Parrish said.

“Then it subsided and we thought it was over, but it started up again,” she said.

This time Oregon was hit as well.

On Tuesday, birds flooded ashore on the Long Beach Peninsula and on beaches as far south as Cannon Beach, prompting an outpouring of calls to the Wildlife Center of the North Coast near Astoria.

The center, the only wildlife rehabilitation facility serving the northern Oregon and Washington coasts, is working around the clock treating more than 500 birds.

“We’re in an emergency crisis mode,” said Dr. Virginia Huang,  president of the center’s board.

Not only are volunteers retrieving struggling birds in northern Oregon and Long Beach, but officials from the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife are also trucking them in from the Olympic Peninsula.

Barbara Linnett, a volunteer at the wildlife center, said the majority of seabirds that have poured in are common murres, common loons, red-throated loons and grebes.

The center feeds them vitamins and fluids to hydrate them, then puts them in shallow pools of water. Swimming in clean water — and preening — helps the seabirds rebuild their waterproofing.

Linnett hopes some of the birds can be released in a few days.

In the meantime, marine biologists from Oregon, Washington and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries Service are watching conditions closely, hoping that this was a freak event.

The last time it occurred was in 2007 in Monterey Bay, when hundreds of seabirds were killed.

“That event enabled us to figure out what is happening here,” Parrish said.   

     

Sustainable Seafoods In The News

California passed a sustainable seafood bill. Yeah for Caliyfornia!   Watch the two videos below. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41TYMH1Ivx0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GdjWhFOF36w

Is Spiritual Connection To Planet The Cure?

Commentary

by

Charmaine Coimbra

C. Coimbra Photo

Yesterday I basked in the salty spray cast from the silver Pacific coast waves gone wild from a latent South Pacific typhoon.  The ocean’s majestic power (and probably a dose of negative ions) energized my spirit.  Experiencing this spectacle of rampant waves that crashed into the sand then ripped back to the sea just to collide with another incoming wave ready to burst open inspired reverence. It was like watching a sacred ceremony inside a most holy of churches.

However, where I stood above this oceanic cathedral, discarded cigarette filters littered the ground like mindless graffiti splattered against an ancient floor.  “What kind of person would do this?” I asked spouse.  His reply was neither gentle nor kind.  Then I wondered out loud, “Do you suppose that the issues that hurt our planet and ourselves will ever be resolved until we find our spiritual connection with the planet?”  Spouse,

C. Coimbra Photo

the misanthropist, thought not.  I, the blogger, determined to find a blogging path for Blog Action Day, www.blogactionday.org decided to put this question out to people on Facebook and my personal e-mail lists.  

 Requesting 50 words or less, I asked: 

 Is it vital to have a spiritual connection to this planet in order to effectively correct the environmental, social, and humanitarian challenges that we/the planet presently face?

 Ava Champion from Jasper, GA emailed this:

“If we look around, we see us, some animals and a planet. EVERYTHING else comes from the planet. We are responsible for only two things:  being born and dying. All that happens in between happens because of where we live, on planet Earth, dare I say Mother Earth? It is impossible to live each day without taking something from this completely giving Mother. Human history is only a fraction of the earth’s history and yet we act as though we are the only reason it exists. When the reality is that the earth would be better off without us. Spiritually, we are lacking. We are not capable of understanding how small we really are. But our Mother continues to give us more than we deserve. We must strive to care for her and each other. Do something good every day. Give something back. Gee, pick up some trash, recycle as much as possible, and do unto others and all that. It will never be enough, but a good mother loves unconditionally. She always gives us another chance.

 Terry Mock  from Redlands, CA, emailed this,

 Yes!  We must respect all living things on this planet.  We must not destroy life-plants, animals, vegetation, sea life or we will destroy ourselves.  We must protect the cycle of life and the air that we breathe.  Do our actions promote life and beauty and preservation of our planet? 

 Jeremy Munds, an Iraq War Veteran and now an imagery analyst with the United States Army, stated,

 

C. Coimbra Photo

No, it is just Loyalty, Duty, Repsect, Honor and Integrity. I have two more but I don’t think that they pertain. They might, so I’ll include Selfless Service and Personal Courage. Spiritual connections, in my eyes, are not needed. The ability to do what is right, legally and morally, even when no one is watching, is what we need to correct things.

Edward Parone of Nambe, NM sent,

For millions of years the earth has contained and produced enough “food”  – animal, vegetable, mineral — to nourish and sustain the creatures and plants who lived on it.  But   since the arrival of homo sapiens we have been steadily and literally eating the planet.   No one can say for sure just how long it will take this over-population to exhaust all the resources that once sustained life, but at the rate we are going,  it is not that far off in evolutionary time.  Gobble gobble, chomp chomp, burn and drown  – and it will all be gone.

 Sarah Doni Swenson, who blogs http://oneheartmanygardens.blogspot.com/  wrote from Seattle,

We have a spiritual connection to Earth regardless of whether we acknowledge it. It is like gravity, which also exists invisibly, and independent of our beliefs. Our challenge is to awaken ourselves in mindfulness to our spiritual nature, which will open the doors to perception that we are all part of everything, and that to heal/hurt some means to heal/hurt all, our planet included. I’ve recently been researching remote healing (also called healing at a distance). If you’re skeptical, Google it and then draw your own conclusions about interconnectedness.” 

Alexis Strong of Santa Fe, noted,

It’s not possible for everyone on the planet to have a spiritual connection with it – so we can only hope that the collective power of who do will transcend mankind’s destruction. I do believe, however, that the planet, in its billion plus years of life, will survive any assault, including the ongoing human one.

 Jim Terr, writer, musician, actor, and all things creative, at  http://www.jimterr.com/  sent from Santa Fe,

I’m not positive what a “spiritual connection” is, but anyone who can’t simply see that unless the earth and everyone on it survives, that none of us do, has probably got their head too far up Rush Limbaugh’s butt to figure seriously into the discussion – except as an obstruction.

____________________

Weather and Earth movements wove in and out of this morning’s national news which included generous bonuses to Wall Street giants, a violent attack by five boys against one boy who told the truth, health care issues posing the haves against the have-nots, nuclear proliferation, and terrorists’ attacks against civilization.  Meanwhile the tiny issue of cigarette butts on the beach seems insignificant until one sees the common thread that fuses today’s news—R-E-S-P-E-C-T–or the lack thereof.

Spirituality is personal.  Action is essential.  Knowledge and education opens the door.

Call to action:

http://www.oceanconservancy.org/

http://www.surfrider.org/

http://www.bluevoice.org/

http://www.montereybayaquarium.org/

http://www.elephantseal.org/

http://www.marinemammalcenter.org/

http://www.worldwildlife.org/

 

Ghost Net Removal Updates

Editor’s Note:  Neptune 911 continues following the issue of ghost nets from our original post http://neptune911.wordpress.com/wp-admin/post.php?action=edit&post=173

Originally printed at http://www.indiancountrytoday.com/national/northwest/59991982.html

PORT TOWNSEND, Wash. (AP) – An operation to clear Puget Sound and the North Olympic Peninsula’s waters of derelict commercial fish nets has cleared more than 10,000 pounds of nets that trapped and killed thousands of salmon, bottom fish, crab, sea mammals and diving birds.

“We’re going full blast now,” said Jeff June, a Northwest Straits Commission consultant who is overseeing diving operations out of Port Townsend and Port Angeles, as well as Everett and Tacoma, that began in July.

June said that, through August, fish net cleanup crews – made up of commercial divers who normally walk the ocean floor for sea cucumbers and geoducks and see the dangers the nets pose – pulled 173 nets, many of them choked with the remains of sea life that include seals and porpoises.

Decades of thriving Puget Sound commercial and recreational fisheries have left tons of old fishing gear behind, as bad weather, mechanical failures and human error caused fishermen to lose or abandon their gear.

Thousands of old crab pots litter the sea floor, and thousands of nets are caught in rocky outcroppings and draped along waterways.

Gill nets and crab pots used by commercial and sport fishers can continue to trap sea life long after the original owners have abandoned the gear.

The Northwest Straits Commission has set a goal to clear 90 percent of existing derelict fishing nets from Puget Sound by 2012 through the Northwest Straits Initiative, which surveys and removes lost fishing gear.

The Northwest Straits Foundation earlier this year was awarded $4.6 million in economic stimulus funding through a grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Over the next 18 months, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds will provide resources to find and remove an estimated 3,000 derelict nets that remain in the Sound.

The project is employing 38 people and restoring 645 acres of marine habitat, Northwest Straits officials said.

Ginny Broadhurst, Northwest Straits Commission director, said the stimulus grant has allowed the underfunded derelict gear program started in 2002 to greatly expand from one original diving boat out of Port Angeles, to four boats today.

“This is going to allow us to stop writing grant proposals and just get the project done,” Broadhurst said, adding that the last grant was for $250,000, and did not stretch nearly as far as the new funding this year that will last for 16 more months.

Brian Santman, who owns the diving boat Tenacious, is operating out of the Port of Port Townsend Boat Haven marina, and his divers are covering the waters off East Jefferson County.

Tom Cowan, Northwest Straits Commission project manager said most crews right now are focusing on the San Juan Islands “because that’s the highest priority today.”

Broadhurst said she did not expect gear removal boats to move back into the Strait until this winter.

Since the Northwest Straits Commission started pulling derelict gear from the Sound and Strait of Juan de Fuca in 2002, the agency reports diving operations have removed 1,287 nets covering 311 acres and weighing 217,747 pounds.

Derelict nets contained 62,796 live and dead animals including 32 dead marine mammals, 650 dead birds, 1,366 live and dead fish and 60,748 live and dead invertebrates, the commission said.

The program has trained 78 divers to perform the work, including 66 from the federal Department of Defense and 12 tribal divers.

Old Mines Ooze Mercury Into Calif. Coastal Waters

From HealthJournalism.org

AP IMPACT: Gov’t stands by as mercury taints water

By JASON DEAREN (AP) – Sep 17, 2009 

NEW IDRIA, Calif. — Abandoned mercury mines throughout central California’s rugged coastal mountains are polluting the state’s major waterways, rendering fish unsafe to eat and risking the health of at least 100,000 impoverished people.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Idria,_California

But an Associated Press investigation found that the federal government has tried to clean up fewer than a dozen of the hundreds of mines — and most cleanups have failed to stem the contamination.

Although the mining ceased decades ago, records and interviews show the vast majority of sites have not even been studied to assess the pollution, let alone been touched.

While millions live in the region, the pollution disproportionately hurts the poor and immigrants who rely on local fish as part of their diet, according to a study conducted by University of California, Davis ecologist Fraser Shilling. His research found that 100,000 people, which he calls a conservative estimate, regularly eat tainted fish at levels deemed unsafe by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

“Tens of thousands of subsistence anglers and their (families) are consuming greater than 10 times the U.S. EPA recommended dose of mercury, which puts them at immediate risk of neurological and other harm,” Shilling said.

But neither the state nor federal government has studied long-term health effects of mercury on the people who regularly eat fish from these waters.

The legacy of more than a century of mercury mining in California — which produced more of the silvery metal than anywhere else in the nation — harms people and the environment in myriad ways.

Near a derelict mine in this California ghost town, the water bubbling in a stream runs Day-Glo Orange and is devoid of life, carrying mercury toward a wildlife refuge and a popular fishing spot.

 

 Far to the north, American Indians who live atop mine waste on the shores of one of the world’s most mercury-polluted lakes have elevated levels of the heavy metal in their bodies and fears about their health.

And other mercury mines are the biggest sources of the pollution in San Francisco Bay and the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, the largest estuary on the Pacific Coast.

In all, this metal known as quicksilver has contaminated thousands of square miles of water and land in the northern half of the state.

Records and interviews show that federal regulators have conducted about 10 cleanups at major mercury mines with mixed results, while dozens of sites still foul the air, soil and water. The AP’s review also found that the government is often loathe to assume cleanup costs and risk litigation from a failed project.

Mercury from mine waste travels up the food chain through bacteria, which converts it to methylmercury — a potent toxin that can permanently damage the brain and nervous system, especially in fetuses and children.

The federal government calls methylmercury one of the nation’s most serious hazardous waste problems, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says it is a possible carcinogen.

Mercury is considered most harmful to people when consumed in fish. People who regularly consume tainted fish are at risk of headaches, tingling, tremors and damage to the brain and nervous system, according to the CDC.

The toxin is less of a threat in drinking water, which is filtered and monitored more closely.

Mining in California ceased decades ago, leaving behind at least 550 mercury mines, though no one knows for sure how many. One U.S. Geological Survey scientist says the total may be as high as 2,000.

Abandoned Mines

“Mercury tops the list as the most harmful invisible pollutant in the (state’s) watershed,” said Sejal Choksi of San Francisco Baykeeper, an environmental watchdog group for the bay. “It has such widespread impacts, and the regulatory agencies are just throwing up their hands.”

In the 19th and 20th centuries, California produced up to 90 percent of the mercury in the U.S. and more than 220 million pounds of quicksilver were shipped around the world for gold mining, military munitions and thermometers. Much of the liquid mercury was sent to Sierra Nevada gold mines, where miners spilled tons of it into streams and soil to extract the precious ore.

“There’s probably a water body near everybody in the state that has significant mercury contamination,” said Dr. Rick Kreutzer, chief of the state Department of Public Health’s Division of Environmental and Occupational Disease Control.

Government officials blame mining companies for shirking their financial responsibilities to clean the sites, either by filing for bankruptcy or changing ownership.

When the government does target a site, success is not guaranteed.

The Sulfur Bank Mine has made the nearby Clear Lake the most mercury-polluted lake in the world, despite the EPA spending about $40 million and two decades trying to keep mercury contamination from the water. Pollution still seeps beneath the earthen dam built by the former mine operator, Bradley Mining Co.

For years, Bradley Mining has fought the government’s efforts to recoup cleanup costs. An attorney for the company didn’t return calls seeking comment.

For the Elem Band of Pomo Indians, whose colony is next to the lake and shuttered mine, the mercury has made it unsafe to eat local fish.

Their colony was built in 1970 by the federal government over waste from the mine. Officials knew it was contaminated, but were not aware at the time how dangerous mercury was to people. The mine is now a Superfund site.

State blood tests on 44 volunteer adult tribe members in the 1990s found elevated levels of mercury. The average level was three times higher than found in people who do not eat tainted fish, but regulators said only one man was at immediate risk of brain damage or other harm.

Yet the EPA determined that the tribe’s mercury levels were a serious enough threat for the agency to spend millions of dollars removing contaminated dirt from the colony’s homes and roads.

Many have moved from the colony, leaving about 60 of what was once a community of more than 200 people.

As a child, Rozan Brown, 31, said she ate lake fish, swam in the turquoise waters of the mine waste pit and played on mercury-tainted mine waste piles.

“When I was pregnant, I drank the water,” Brown said. “When I was breast-feeding, I worked as a laborer during some of the (mercury) cleanups.”

The CDC says high levels of mercury can cause brain damage and mental retardation in children when passed from mother to fetus. Brown’s son, Tiyal, has been diagnosed with autism. The CDC has found no link between mercury and autism, but agency spokesperson Dagny Olivares said in an e-mail, “Additional information is needed to fully evaluate the potential health threats.”

At most abandoned mercury mines, especially ones in remote places, nothing gets done at all.

Twenty-seven years ago the EPA shut down New Idria Mine, once the second-largest mercury producer in North America. The mine and its towering blast furnace still sit untouched. Acidic runoff flows from hills of waste and miles of tunnels into a pool that smells like rotten eggs. The toxic brew turns nearby San Carlos Creek orange and kills aquatic life before flowing into the San Joaquin River.

“It’s really hard living up here,” said Kate Woods, 51, standing on a wooden bridge in front of her rural home, tucked amid the hills and cattle ranches just downstream of the mine. “It would be paradise here but for this damned orange creek.”

Woods and her brother, Kemp, experience tremors in their hands and headaches, she said, blaming prolonged mercury exposure through water and dust. The EPA found mercury in the creek exceeding federal standards in 1997, records show. Field researchers sent a “high priority” referral to state water quality regulators, warning the mercury could be migrating into a popular fishing area and eventually to the Delta-Mendota Canal, “a drinking water conveyance to other parts of California.”

 

Neither agency undertook the expensive cleanup, nor did they conduct the follow-up studies to find out if New Idria’s mercury was the source of the contamination found downstream.

EPA officials said mines such as New Idria are a concern but are not always the agency’s highest priority.

“We are here to protect the environment, and sometimes we do it better than other times,” said Daniel Meer, EPA’s assistant Superfund director for the region. “We can’t start cleaning up everything all at once.”

The EPA, with financial help from the mine owners, has covered up waste piles at two mines feeding pollution into Cache Creek to try to reduce the mercury flowing into the Delta, but no one has touched the other problem sites.

At least 13 other mine sites also pollute Cache Creek, and are responsible for 60 percent of the mercury in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, where thousands regularly catch and eat local fish, state water quality officials said.

“What can we do? We’re evaluating that now,” said Jerry Bruns, a mercury control official with the Central Valley Water Quality Control Board. “It’s complicated, we can’t just go in there and do whatever we want. There are Native American archaeological sites and different landowners.”

A separate cluster of derelict mercury mines near San Jose has been called the largest source of the toxin in the San Francisco Bay’s south end, where warning signs warn fishermen of the “poisonous mercury” polluting the water.

A solution to California’s mercury pollution is nowhere near at hand, state and federal regulators say.

“It took a hundred years to occur,” said the EPA’s Meer. “And it may take a hundred years or more to solve.”

Copyright © 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

F for Disney Cruise Lines, A for Texas, F for Mafia, A for Coral Recovery

Cruise Ship Environmental Report Card

Cruises at sea can be a blast.  They can also be a negative blast to the environment.  Consider the trash and sewage collected on board. A 3000 person cruise generates hundreds of thousand gallons of human sewage—alone.  Some liners have taken positive action to reduce their environmental impact, others, have not.  To our surprise, Disney Cruise Line is the worst rated on a recent Friends of the Earth Cruise Ship Report Card.  Check it out at http://www.foe.org/cruisereportcard.  Mickey Mouse needs to clean up his act.

 

Texas announces $135.4M coastal protection plan

By JUAN A. LOZANO (AP) – Sep 14, 2009

HOUSTON — Texas announced Monday that it was embarking on the biggest coastal protection effort in state history to fight beach erosion and defend against future hurricanes.

The $135.4 million plan comes just a year after Hurricane Ike’s powerful storm surge damaged thousands of homes in Galveston, the neighboring Bolivar Peninsula and other communities across southeast Texas. The Sept. 13, 2008 hurricane also scoured away beaches, submerged marshes in seawater and ruined thousands of acres of vegetation.

“We’ve been trying to do large scale projects like this for quite some time but (Hurricane) Ike has accelerated our efforts and created a greater sense of urgency,” Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson said in a telephone interview shortly after announcing the plan in Galveston. “It’s the largest commitment to coastal protection in the history of Texas.”

Work will begin immediately on 26 projects from South Padre Island in South Texas to McFaddin National Wildlife Refuge on the upper Texas Coast, Patterson said. The projects have different timelines for being completed.

The biggest project will be a more than $46 million beach renourishment that will replace sand over a stretch of six miles from the west end of Galveston’s famed seawall.

Another stretch of Galveston’s beaches, which are a big tourist attraction but also fortify the seawall, were replenished earlier this year after being eroded by Ike. The 10-mile long seawall has protected the island city since it was built after the Great Storm of 1900, which killed 6,000 people.

Other projects include:

_ a $32 million project that will restore dunes along 20 miles of beaches that protect the McFaddin National Wildlife Refuge. The 55,000 acre refuge protects one of the largest remaining freshwater marshes on the Texas Coast.

_ an $18.3 million project to rebuild dunes on Bolivar Peninsula. Ike’s storm surge overwhelmed this thin strip of land along the Gulf of Mexico, washing away or damaging 3,600 homes and other structures.

_ a $1 million test project in South Padre Island that will place low profile stabilizers, or concrete filled tubes, underwater in beaches on the north end. The stabilizers will slow down erosion by retaining sand usually lost to waves and currents.

Patterson said these projects will protect not just the state’s physical assets but also the economy.

“It’s going to protect the dollars that are generated in the coast,” he said. “Without a beach in front of the seawall in Galveston, there are no tourists. Without tourists, no hotel motel taxes, no sales taxes generated.”

Patterson said the state is allocating $25 million for the effort. Matching funds from local communities and the federal government is increasing the total to more than $135 million.

A telephone message left Monday with the Gulf Restoration Network was not immediately returned.

Copyright © 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

Mafia and Toxic Wastes In Our Seas

http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE58E38K20090915?feedType=RSS&feedName=environmentNews

ROME (Reuters) – Italian authorities have found the wreck of a ship sunk by the mafia with 180 barrels of toxic waste on board, one of more than 30 such vessels believed to lie off Italy’s southern coast, officials said on Tuesday.

Following a lead from a mafia turncoat, investigators used a remote-controlled submersible to film the 110-meter (360-feet) long vessel on Saturday, around 28 km (18 miles) from the coast of the southwestern Italian region of Calabria.

The ship, which officials say may even contain radioactive elements, lay in 500 meters (yards) of water in the Tyrrhenian sea. TV images showed at least one barrel had fallen from its damaged hull and lay empty on the seabed.

“There could be problems of toxins and heavy metals … this is an issue for the whole international community,” said Silvestro Greco, head of Calabria’s environment agency.

The ship’s location was revealed by Francesco Fonti, an ex-member of Calabria’s feared ‘Ndrangheta crime group, who confessed to using explosives to sink this vessel and two others.

Greco said investigators believed there were 32 ships carrying toxic waste sunk by the mafia since the introduction of tighter environmental legislation in the 1980s made illegal waste disposal a lucrative business for crime groups.

“The Mediterranean is 0.7 percent of the world’s seas. If in this tiny portion there are more than 30 (toxic waste) shipwrecks, imagine what there could be elsewhere,” he said.

(Reporting by Antonio Denti and Daniel Flynn; Editing by Louise Ireland)

Remote Coral Reef Recovers

From http://montereybayaquarium.typepad.com/sea_notes/2009/09/coral_economy.html

Right now, most people are focused on an economic recovery and liking the signs they see, but marine scientists are also excited about a different kind of recovery: a coral reef that is gradually restoring itself back to health. The economic value of coral reefs should not be underestimated either. Many important fisheries rely on coral habitat, as does the tourist industry.

A few years ago, the world’s remotest coral reef of the Phoenix Islands, part of the Republic of Kiribati  - in the Pacific - experienced a coral die-off event known as bleaching. This is when the tiny plants (algae) that live within the coral and provide it with the nutrients it needs, die, and the corals turn white without their symbiotic plant support. Coral bleaching is induced by warming waters. With ocean temperatures increasing around the world, scientists have long feared for the future of our coral reefs, with some estimating that warm water corals could be gone by 2050 if we continue to warm our water and not control our CO2 emissions. Corals are also impacted by the increasing acidity of our oceans, as the oceans absorb our pollution. We will be telling this important story in our new temporary exhibition opening in March 2010.

So scientists on a return trip to the Phoenix Islands recently were astonished and delighted to find that over half of the coral reef had regenerated and was teeming with life; corals are critical habitat for so many creatures.

The region is being proposed as a World Heritage Site, and perhaps this additional protection may have some benefits. But what is really important here is the ability of our ecosystems to self heal, if left alone from human interference. Marine scientists have been saying that this is true for some time – and other examples – closing areas to fishing, species protection etc. have shown it time and time again. But this is yet another example of how nature knows best and if we can allow it space and time, it can recover and renew.

Trash We Left At The Beach

Photos and Story

by

Charmaine Coimbra

September 19, 2009

I dumped four-pounds of trash at Hearst Memorial State Beach this morning.  That doesn’t include the dozen recyclable drink containers and

Some of the trash I left at the beach

food wrappers.  I left them there too.

I’d bet the other folks with us this morning left behind another 20 to 50# of trash and recyclables.  And after I left my trash behind and drove home I witnessed dozens of other folks at neighboring beaches repeating my actions.  So I’d guess that a dump truck-sized load of trash was left along California’s central coast this morning.

Not to worry.  I’ve not gone mad.  All this trash was handed over to the volunteers working for  the Ocean Conservancy’s International Coastal Cleanup today.  How much trash was picked up and removed from waterways and beaches today, the numbers aren’t in, but “last year, nearly 400,000 volunteers collected more than 6.8 million pounds of trash in 100 countries and 42 US states during the 2008 International Coastal Cleanup,” notes the Ocean Conservancy website  www.oceanconservancy.org.

That means fewer albatross will consume plastic cigarette lighters today, less seals will become entangled in fishing debris, a few less mermaid tears  (http://neptune911.wordpress.com/2009/08/18/mermaid-tears-another-nautical-disaster/) will form and later be consumed by the fish we will likely consume down the road, and a few more marine mammals will not mistake floating plastic bags for jellyfish.  Perhaps a few more whale necropsies won’t discover 400 pounds of plastic in their bellies.  All of today’s beach cleanup will also not add to the growing island of trash in the Pacific Ocean.

Our volunteer team of five included enthusiastic Ryan Gunter, an 11-year-old who volunteered with his grandparents, Bob and Kay Baker of

Ryan Gunter shows off his found debris

Cambria.  Ryan’s finds included a necklace, which if once washed into the sea, would eventually break  down into bite-sized plastic beads resembling fish eggs to hungry fish. Besides tiny bits of broken plastic, bottle caps and food wrappers  we also added one plastic flip flop to the trash bag.

Here are some downloadable pdf-format booklets about debris and our waterways:

A Guide To Marine Debris:   

http://www.oceanconservancy.org/site/DocServer/ICCmarineDebrisGuideReadOnly.pdf?docID=5441

The Rising Tide of Ocean Debris:  

 http://www.oceanconservancy.org/pdf/A_Rising_Tide_full_hires.pdf

Rediscovery of the Snubfin Dolphin in Papua New Guinea

9/17/09 Editor’s Note: A good deal of search terms are about the condition of California Sea Lions.  Click this link for the most recent update: http://neptune911.wordpress.com/california-sea-lions-experiencing-more-deaths/

 Part 1.   To the Kikori River Delta. 

 By

Frank Bonaccorso 

(For more stories by Frank, click:  http://neptune911.wordpress.com/2009/04/23/a-bittersweet-moment-at-two-oceans-aquarium/)

Kikori Bound

 From inside a deafening Twin Otter prop plane piloted by my Port Moresby Running Club friend, Captain Bruce Alabaster, I enjoyed the ride 8,000 feet above the southern coast of Papua New Guinea (PNG). It was 1999. I watched the mud flats, sand bars, mangroves, and sandy beaches pass below. Farther out to sea there were white-capped waves.  We were now flying west of the Purari River Delta where no road penetrates the tidelands.  Soooo beautiful!  There had been no signs of human disturbance since we left the intermediate stop-over town of Kerema more than 20 minutes ago.  Far below in the wet coastal lowland, numerous rivers meandered maze-like through raffia palm swamps.   Thankfully, I packed a huge supply of mosquito repellents.

Kikori Basin River

My assistant from the PNG National Museum, Jimmy Animiato, sat across the aisle and gazed out the window while sipping on refreshments provided by the steward who doubled as co-pilot for Milne Bay Airlines.  Jimmy cradled a hot paper cup of Red Rose Tea and chomped on a thick, hard Whopper biscuit, something akin to the standard fare hard-tack issued to the Army of Virginia in the Civil War, and popular in PNG even to this day.  

After months of confinement in the Museum and Port Moresby, this was high adventure for Jimmy as much as for me. As Chief Curator and Head of the Department of Natural History, I planned to take every opportunity to further scientific discovery in a land where many new species of animals and plants were still being found at regular intervals.  When I requested funding to search for a rare river dolphin not reported in Papua New Guinea waters for decades, a regional director for a New York-based wildlife conservation society rejected my grant proposal noting: It’s like searching for the Loch Ness Monster…..blah, blah, blah….no we are not interested in funding you. 

 Fortunately, The World Wildlife Fund for Nature (WWF) and the Chevron Oil Company took my proposal seriously. They supported our small scientific team to explore the coast of Western Province in the vicinity of the Kikori River delta with the major goal of finding the rare snubfin dolphin at the northern end of its possible geographic range. 

Bruce circled the Kikori airstrip and then performed a routine landing. When the props stopped, we disembarked the Otter into air as steamy as a scalding sauna.  At the side of the airstrip, WWF staff field biologist, Tanya Leary waited.  In 1999 the Kikori conservation area was a natural reserve and buffer area around the Chevron New Guinea oil fields and its Kikori River transport channel. 

A quick motor-tour of Kikori Town exposed a population of several dozen houses made of wood, topped with zinc corrugated roofing.   Commerce was limited trade stores that sold only the most basic goods.  I heeded Tanya’s previous suggestion– Pack plenty of condiments to spice up your daily rice.  Our imported condiments saved us from the boredom of rice on rice meals at the Chevron camp. 

From Kikori, we traveled upriver by motor launch to the Chevron compound at Kopi.    

Snubfin Dolphins—Remote and Misidentified

Snubfin dolphin

 Together with Tanya and Jimmy, I would be searching for one of the least known dolphins in the world.  The snubfin dolphin, today known to science as Orcaella heinsohni, is only eight-feet long from its blunt snout to its flukes. As recent as 2005, it was named as a distinct species by an Australian marine biologist, Isabel Beasley.  Snubfins previously were lumped together with the Irrawaddy Dolphin as Orcaella brevirostris. (See Beasley et al. Marine Mammal Science Volume 21, pages 365–400, 2005).  Beasley was a perceptive scientist, at the right place at the correct time to garner the rare honor of naming a new dolphin. Her DNA studies on snubfins occurring in waters across the shallow Torres Strait from PNG confirmed that snubfins in nearby Northern Australia were a species apart from their close cousins living several thousand miles to the west in the rivers and coastal deltas of peninsular Malaysia. 

Snubfin dolphins in PNG lived in areas so remote from westerners and trained scientists that it was over 40 years since they had been seen by the only person to report them in a published scientific work.  Records of this animal from the other side of the border along the southern coast of the Indonesian province of Irian Jaya[1] were even older and somewhat dubious because eyewitness accounts were limited to reports from sea captains along the Asmat Coast.  In fact, no bones or other physical material existed in any museum to provide hard documentation that snubfins occurred in PNG.  If we could not find a dolphin carcass or bleached bones, our team at least hoped to obtain photographs and precise GPS positions of the snubfin.

 During our 1999 Kikori River expedition, Tanya, Jimmy and I believed we were searching for Orcaella brevirostris, the Irrawaddy dolphin.  Beasley still had not conducted her research.  At that time we operated under the false belief that lumped snubfin and Irrawaddy dolphins as one species despite the huge deep water ocean gap separating these exclusively coastal and freshwater species.  Today we realize that the Irrawaddy dolphin as the sister species of the snubfin is limited to a distribution from peninsular Malaysia to the Bay of Bengal in India.

It’s All In The Planning

 We traveled under blue skies, everyone clustering under the canvas canopy in an open motor-boat headed upriver to a landing dock at Kopi. Here we transferred to a four-wheel drive double cab pick-up truck (called a ute as an abbreviation for utility vehicle by New Guineans and Australians) and headed up a well groomed road maintained by Chevron to the company staff compound.  Most of the technical staff of engineers, geologists, oil riggers, and helicopter pilots living at the compound spent two weeks on duty, followed by two weeks off-duty in Cairns, Australia. We were warned that our bags would be thoroughly inspected by a security team going into camp as alcohol and drugs were strictly taboo.  It was totally “dry” in the camp as far as alcohol was concerned.  The good news was that our assigned rooms were air-conditioned, had hot showers, and satellite TV.  Also the cafeteria served all you can eat buffet meals.

WWF had a couple of small rooms serving as office space in the compound.        After dinner we poured over contour maps of our intended search area and marked out a zigzag flight route that we would recommend to our helicopter pilot in the morning.  Chevron picked up all costs for the flight time and provided a piloted four-seat chopper. We had access to the chopper as long as no high priority oil company missions or emergencies developed, and provided the weather was acceptable.  

With two consecutive morning scheduled flights, we planned the most efficient search route. Thereafter, we were limited to small surface boats to continue our snubfin search. 

 I was psyched with anticipation. This was my first aerial survey for a marine mammal. The largest river in the region, the Fly River, although formerly providing potentially dolphin friendly habitat in past years, was now polluted by gold and copper mining tailings and garbage to the point it was considered a “dead” river.  Could we rediscover an animal that many people doubted existed any longer in Papua New Guinea?  Snubfin dolphins require large, flowing rivers and river mouths for the bottom fish in its diet.  The correct conditions within the likely geographic range of the dolphin in all of Papua New Guinea were only present in this general coastal region of Gulf and Western Province in the southwest corner of PNG.   I watched TV and read a book but my anticipation was stoked so high that it was well past midnight before I could drift off to sleep.

 

 End of Part 1 — Coming in Part 2.   The Aerial Search for the Snubfin Dolphin.
 

 [1] Irian Jaya is known as West Papua by local people of New Guinea origin. New Guinea peoples generally oppose a repressive regime imposed by Indonesia. Indonesia took possession of the western half of New Guinea when a power resulted first by the collapse of the Japanese occupation in the late stages of World War II and then by the failed attempt at re-establishing its former colonial empire in the area by the Dutch.

 

 

---

Neptune’s Nightmares: Lawns, Green Algae, Plastics & Medical Wastes

Editor’s Collection of News About the Seas From Around the Planet

Coastal Dead Zones, Contaminated Fish, and Lawns

From  Scientific American     http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/60-second-science/post.cfm?id=the-suburban-lawn-enemy-of-lakes-oc-2009-08-19

The typical suburban home is an underestimated source of water pollution, according to research presented today at the American Chemical Society meeting in Washington, D.C. The reason? Lawns and gardens.

Water that runs off from these green acres typically picks up a load of fertilizers, pesticides and other potentially toxic chemicals, and washes them—via sewers or directly—into lakes, rivers, streams and even the ocean. Once there, joined by similar runoff from agriculture, the chemicals can drive a host of environmental problems, ranging from dead zones to contaminated fish.

Previous estimates of how much water pollution derived from the suburbs was based simply on rainfall. But horticulturalist Lorence Oki of the University of California, Davis, and his colleagues found that sprinklers and other irrigation techniques also led to significant runoff that, in some cases, carried more pollution with it from the eight neighborhoods studied in Sacramento and Orange counties than runoff after a rain storm.

Pesticides—both organophosphates and pyrethroids—were found in all the water samples, which were collected on a weekly, biweekly and monthly basis for more than two years. The majority of these pesticides, 60 percent, were purchased to control ants, according to a survey by the California Department of Pesticide Regulation.

But there is a simple solution to lawn runoff. A study at the University of Michigan, published online August 14 in the journal Lakes and Rivers Management , found that Ann Arbor’s ban on phosphorous fertilizers for grass led to a 28 percent drop in the pollutant’s levels in nearby Huron River.

Keeping lawn-care chemicals out of U.S. waters may be as simple as banning them—or at least cutting down on running the sprinklers right after applying fertilizers or pesticides.

 French PM orders beach clean-up

French Prime Minister Francois Fillon has announced his government will pay for cleaning French beaches polluted by a toxic seaweed. He was speaking during a visit to a

beach in Brittany where the green algae has been proliferating for years. A new study says the algae can pose a potentially fatal health threat.

Local communities in Brittany have long criticised the government for failing to address the problem, calling on it to help clean up the beaches.

The killer algae is also affecting the English coastline – particularly Dorset, Hampshire, the Isle of Wight and West Sussex.

On Wednesday, the UK Environment Agency said the algae was threatening wildlife along the coast.

‘Taking charge’

In France, Mr Fillon visited a beach in Saint-Michel-en-Greve to see the situation for himself.

“The state will assume all of its responsibilities and will take charge of the clean-up of the worst affected beaches, where there could be a public health risk,” he said.

On the same beach, a horse-rider was rendered unconscious and his mount died after slipping on the algae late last month, apparently after inhaling toxic gas released by the rotting seaweed.

The incident prompted the French government to commission a study on the algae’s toxicity, which stems from a noxious gas – hydrogen sulphide – being emitted as the seaweed decomposes.

Researchers from France’s National Institute for Environmental Technology and Hazards (Ineris) found a potentially lethal concentration of the hydrogen sulphide on parts of the beach.

They studied algae samples from the Saint-Michel-en-Greve beach, and found a concentration of the gas of up to 1,000 parts per million in some areas of the beach.

If inhaled, such a concentration of gas “can be deadly in few minutes”, said their report, which was published on Thursday.

The report recommended banning access to potentially dangerous areas, and equipping algae clearing workers with gas detectors.

Intensive agriculture is often blamed for the proliferation of algae along France’s coasts.

The seaweed thrives on high levels of nitrates used in fertilisers and excreted by the region’s high concentration of livestock.

The UK Environment Agency said tighter controls on farming fertiliser and sewage plants should begin to starve the algae of the nutrients it needs to survive.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/europe/8212896.stm

Monterey Bay Aquarium Talking Trash & Eliminating More Plastics

Researchers from the Project Kaisei/Scripps expedition to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch are back ashore. They’re sharing what they found .

… there’s an obscene amount of plastic debris floating in the ocean, causing a great deal of harm to marine life that confuses plastic with food.

While they expedition team was at sea, new research found that it’s not just debris that’s a problem. Turns out the plastic decomposes in seawater, leaving behind a soup of toxic chemicals that poses an additional set of problems for marine life.

It’s a wake-up call to deal with how we use plastics. Here at Monterey Bay Aquarium, our cafe has eliminated all plastic straws and disposable beverage cups, and switched to plant-based materials for “plastic” food containers. We’re reducing the amount of disposable plastic used elsewhere — including encouragement for our vendors not to use plastic shrink-wrap on products they ship to us.

 

Medical Wastes Wash Up the Jersey Shores

From http://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/news/breaking/article_246070d0-9bdc-11de-8156-001cc4c03286.html

Five syringes that look like the types used for home medical treatment were found Monday along the shore of Long Beach Township and Ship Bottom, Long Beach Island’s health officer said.

The first three needles were recovered between 11:30 and 11:45 a.m. in the vicinity of 11th, 15th and 21st streets in Ship Bottom, health officer Tim Hilferty said. The other two needles were discovered at about 3:30 p.m. by 16th street in the North Beach Haven section of Long Beach Township and 23rd street in the Spray Beach section of the township.

No one was hurt, and none of the beach locations were closed. Hilferty said the syringes probably washed up because of the constant pattern of combined sewer overflows and heavy surf.

LBI beach patrols found 16 syringes washed ashore Thursday, and another three turned up Friday morning.

The Long Beach Township and Ship Bottom beach patrols canvassed the beaches and did not find any other medical waste. A staff environmental health specialist was dispatched to the beaches to pick up the debris, which will be properly disposed of later, Hilferty said. The state Department of Environmental Protection was notified about the discoveries.

E-mail Michelle Lee:

MLee@pressofac.com