Scientists see 'tipping point' on ocean plastics

Washington — Researchers say headlines like a whale dying from eating plastic bags or a viral video of a straw up a turtle's nose are galvanizing public attention on health of the oceans.

Advocates for cleaner oceans believe public concern is at an all-time high, with worries about plastics pollution as the driving force.

At least that was the view from a June 6 Washington forum marking U.S.-European scientific cooperation on oceans.

"The one issue that has grabbed every citizen around the globe's attention is plastics," said Peter Heffernan, CEO of Marine Institute Ireland. "It's been the magic moment."

Scientists and others at the event reviewed scientific concerns about plastics waste, from trash washing up on shores around the world to newer worries like how plastic is now being found in the food chain, from plankton on up to birds and fish.

Since plastics grab the public mind more forcefully than other environmental problems, like ocean dead zones, they talked about tapping into that concern to advance a whole range of marine issues.

"Ocean plastics provides us an opportunity... to advance all of ocean science," said Jon White, president and CEO of the Washington-based Consortium for Ocean Leadership.

A Smithsonian Institution scientist sees intense interest in problems from ocean plastics.

"I think plastics are one of the few things that happen to the ocean that are not out of sight, out of mind," said Nancy Knowlton, the institution's Sant Chair for Marine Science. "My sense is we are at a tipping point with plastic pollution."

The forum was organized to recognize the fifth anniversary of the Galway Statement, a 2013 European Union-United States-Canada agreement on furthering Atlantic Ocean research.

While the discussions included a wide range of issues, worries about plastics pollution featured prominently. Scientists and government officials like the EU ambassador to the United States and an assistant U.S. secretary of state talked about the research and policy agenda.

Heffernan, whose group works on many ocean problems, noted plastics are part of the conversation at the highest levels of government, like the national leaders in the G7 group of industrial democracies, who adopted a plastics charter at its meeting in early June.

"You look at what is happening, the G7 and the initiatives of Germany and the fantastic leadership to push ocean issues on a recurring agenda basis at the G7, [it's] plastics communicating like never before to a global audience," he said.

"Plastics is something that connects with [the public] and makes them realize that every single purchase they can make around plastic, every single use of plastic and every single choice they make, they have the power to make that influence," Heffernan said.

Knowlton, who leads efforts to get scientists to communicate better with the public, urged the forum to focus on telling positive stories that "give people a vision of what a plastics-free or a less plastics world would look like."

In the event's keynote speech, she talked about how it's important to tell the public how some environmental cleanups are working, like the decades-long effort to remove nutrient pollution from the Chesapeake Bay or Tampa Bay and help return them to better health.

And she noted that research is showing some success with plastics cleanups. For example, a study has found that plastic bag bans have reduced the amount of bag waste on the sea floor, she said.

"We need to document the successes we have, we're just really starting to do that," Knowlton said. She and colleagues have organized conferences around that theme and started a twitter hashtag "#oceanoptimism."

Still, she argued that new studies continue to find concerns about plastics, like a recent paper showing a connection between marine plastic pollution and increasing levels of disease on coral reefs.

"The amount of science going on about pollution in the ocean and plastic pollution is just staggering," she told the audience. "I describe it as a tsunami."

In an interview after her speech, Knowlton offered some scientific perspective on plastics in the marine environment.

"I actually think there are problems that are bigger problems with the ocean," she said. "I think, historically ... overfishing was sort of the first thing humans did to the oceans, and they caused the collapse of a number of coastal ecosystems, that's been known for a number of decades.

"Pollution, the growing dead zones, places with little or no oxygen, are huge problems," she said. "Plastic pollution didn't cause the Great Barrier Reef to bleach or lose half of the living coral in the most pristine parts. That was caused by climate change."

But she said there's evidence that the ever-increasing amount of plastic in the oceans causes real harm.

"It has a big impact on large vertebrates that are swimming in the ocean, they get tangled up in it, they eat it, birds as well, they can feed from above," she said. "They are being decimated from plastics pollution."

As well, she said plastics can do "quite a lot of harm" when sitting at the bottom of sensitive environments like coral reefs. And there are many questions and concerns about microplastics and plankton, at the bottom of the food chain he said.

"So [plastic pollution] is a big problem but it's not like if we solved that problem, then the rest of the ocean is fine," she said.

Heffernan, the Irish scientist who said he's a 25-year veteran of ocean work, said the public attention around plastics creates a unique opportunity the marine science community should seize.

"I think the plastics issue has brought [the public] and I know from my experience how hard it is to get that moment," he said. "Let's not be the generation that blows that opportunity. We will never have another decade of the oceans in our lifetime. It is now. Let us realize that in a short time we can make the biggest momentum shift ever on the oceans."