There are trillions of microplastics in the ocean — they bob on the surface, float through the water column, and accumulate in clusters on the seafloor. With plastic being so…
In 1997, Charles Moore was sailing a catamaran from Hawaii to California when he and his crew got stuck in windless waters in the North Pacific Ocean. As they motored…
A microplastic is a tiny speck of a thing. At its largest, it’s about the size of a linseed, but smaller microplastics can’t be seen with the naked eye. Minuscule…
In 2018, Lauren Biermann was scouring a satellite image of the ocean off the coast of the Isle of May, Scotland, searching for signs of floating seaweed for a project…
Fast fashion and the environment We live in a world of fast fashion, a model that relies on frequent, trend-driven, impulse buying of cheaply manufactured clothing that often ends up…
BALI, Indonesia — It’s just after sunrise here in Bali, and a group of locals are preparing to sail their wooden boats out to a bay off Nusa Lembongan, a…
In late 2018, researchers announced that they had found synthetic particles like microplastics in the intestinal tracts of every single sea turtle they’d studied in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans…
BALI, Indonesia — Waves roll in over the black volcanic sand on Sogsogan, a beach in southern Bali. Further out, surfers prepare to master the swell. Bali has long been…
DUMAGUETE, Philippines — Microplastics for breakfast? It might be likely as a newly published study shows concentrates of small plastic particles, or microplastics, inside the digestive systems of rabbitfish (Siganid…
DAVAO, Philippines – On August 4, 2018, a fisherman found an endangered green turtle (Chelonia mydas) floating weakly in the Davao Gulf, a diverse marine ecosystem and rich fishing ground spanning 308,000…
Over the past decade, the world has begun to realize that microscopic plastic particles infest our lakes, our seas, and even our bodies. A new study reveals that even the…
New research finds that large filter feeders in the waters of Indonesia could be ingesting dozens to hundreds of microplastic particles every hour. Due to their filter feeding strategy, manta…
A new report from the environmental organization Greenpeace warns that large companies are only deepening the world’s plastic crisis, even as they voice support for supposed solutions. “Due to public…
The scope of the microplastic pollution problem is astonishing. While nations need to slow the rate of plastics entering Earth's waters, discovering what the density of it is, and where…
Sri Lanka’s southern coastline is dotted with popular resorts and beaches, but this once pristine landscape hasn’t been spared by the global plastic waste crisis, a study finds. The authors…
JAKARTA — A ban on single-use plastics on the Indonesian island of Bali will stay in place, after the country’s top court rejected a challenge by the plastic-recycling industry. The…
JAKARTA — The Indonesian government plans to burn waste to fuel power plants in four cities on the island of Java this year as part of efforts to tackle the…
Some of the countries most responsible for the plastic waste that ends up in the oceans have pledged to tackle the problem together, but activists say they’re focusing on the…
Scientists have fretted over the expanding masses of plastic in the ocean for decades. Most have seen the rise with their own eyes, and yet the available datasets typically don’t…
Earth’s oceans are drowning in plastic. Humans created 311 million metric tons of the stuff in 2014, and it is expected that we’ll be making four times as much by…
WATAMU, Kenya — One Saturday mid-morning in late January, close to 100 people descended on the narrow streets of Watamu village along Kenya’s north coast to clean up the streets.…
Researchers who examined 50 marine mammals that had washed up on Britain’s shores say they found microplastics in the guts of every single animal. In a paper published in the…
A recent study found microplastics in the intestines of humans around the globe, and new research has now done the same for sea turtles. Researchers at the UK’s University of…
Competition for fish stocks with fisheries to feed humans could be forcing seabirds to go hungry, according to new research. The study, published Dec. 6 in the journal Current Biology,…
Plastic pollution in the ocean is a growing threat to the survival of sea turtles, endangering the life cycle of these ancient marine globetrotters, according to a new study. Researchers…
The impact of plastic on the world's oceans has been garnering a lot of attention of late, with consumer products companies, governments, and restaurants chains making high profile commitments ranging…
The Mediterranean island of Cyprus isn’t somewhere you might normally associate with record levels of waste. The mythological birthplace of Aphrodite, the ancient Greek goddess of love, Cyprus conjures images…
A study conducted with participants from across the globe found that every single stool sample collected tested positive for the presence of microplastics. Researchers from the Medical University of Vienna…
In a video that went viral in 2015, researchers spent nearly 10 minutes pulling out a 10-centimeter (4-inch) plastic straw from the nostril of a male olive ridley turtle (Lepidochelys olivacea)…
YOGYAKARTA, Indonesia — Dressed in a hazmat suit with boots, gloves and a mask, Prigi Arisandi waded into a river north of Yogyakarta, a city in the center of the…