# Microplastic Fibres



## Dave (Jan 29, 2012)

Just when you thought we might have a handle on global warming, f-gas ozone depletion, loss of biodiversity, loss of soils, algal blooms, human over-population, and mineral resource depletion, along comes another end of the world environmental scenario 

When I read this it I immediately thought there is an idea here for a book along the lines of ice-9. Yes folks, forget DDT in the food chain, it is our synthetic clothes that are going to kill us all in the end!!!  

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-16709045

It makes perfect sense though. If you walk on a beach you will see polystyrene balls and PET bottles, but you cannot see the invisible plastic microfibres that must also be covering everything. 


> "Research we had done before... showed that when we looked at all the bits of plastic in the environment, about 80% was made up from smaller bits of plastic," said co-author Mark Browne, an ecologist now based at the University of California, Santa Barbara.





> "We were quite surprised. Some polyester garments released more than 1,900 fibres per garment, per wash," Dr Browne observed.


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## Vertigo (Jan 29, 2012)

Whoah that is not good but I suppose it shouldn't really be too surprising. We really aren't making a very good job of the gaurdianship of our planet are we?


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## Nik (Jan 30, 2012)

Uh, is that '1900' with or without fabric softener ??

Seriously, it would be a cruel irony if energy-saving cool-washes generated more fragments from their cold-stiffened fabric than hot wash cycles...


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## Snowdog (Jan 30, 2012)

Nik said:


> Uh, is that '1900' with or without fabric softener ??
> 
> Seriously, it would be a cruel irony if energy-saving cool-washes generated more fragments from their cold-stiffened fabric than hot wash cycles...



The law of unintended consequences is with us always. The problem of micro-fibres has already been raised, to do with the biodegradeabilty of plastic bags, seemingly to nothing, but not really. You just can't see what's left over.

The general problem of waste plastic is well-known but I don't know what, if anything, is being done about it. We can't stop using plastic, there isn't enough natural material to make all the things we use. The answer lies with industry and government, as usual. Making plastic biodegradeable might have seemed like the answer, but it turns out it isn't, because it's not really degrading, just becoming too small to see. The question is, is the government only concerned with _seeming_ to act (e.g. lightbulbs and carbon trading), in which case they'll be happy with 'out of sight, out of mind', or do they really care enough the force the chemical industry to come up with a solution (such as a wholesale move to starch-based plastics)? Though that won't remove the mountains of harmful plastic already poisoning the environment.


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## Metryq (Jan 31, 2012)

Well said, Snowdog. (We should preserve that post in plastic!  ) Maybe we'll invite the Andromeda Strain down here to depolymerize all those unwanted six-pack rings.


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## Snowdog (Jan 31, 2012)

Thanks, but I'd rather you used irreplaceable natural resources and laser it onto a metal plaque somewhere. Plastic is so downmarket...

Natural has become a status symbol...

We need a plastic detector and something that draws plastic (like a magnet with iron filings), then go along all the beaches and through all the sea surfaces and collect this stuff, compress it into huge balls, then send it up into space and stuff it into purpose-built containers (made out of recycled plastic of course) up in orbit (or on the moon). If Earth isn't going to turn into one enormous garbage dump, we either stop making stuff that doesn't degrade or we ship it off the Earth.

After his first paying passengers, Richard Branson should go for the garbage concession (and I should get royalties for the idea).


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## Vertigo (Jan 31, 2012)

There's a part of me that agrees with you Snowdog but I have this nagging voice at the back of my head. I'm by no means knowledgeable on this topic but as I understand it most plastic is made from oil (a fast diminishing resource) and all that rubbish plastic is therefore, in it's own way, irreplaceable. One day we may be able to reuse it much more effectively (I know some sorts of plastic can be recycled now but not all of them) and so to chuck it away would seem a little rash. But we could certaily do with getting it out of polluting our environment.


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## Snowdog (Jan 31, 2012)

Well if we stick it 'up there', we can always get it back if we find a way to recycle it properly.


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## Vertigo (Jan 31, 2012)

True enough


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## SamanthaMcquire (Mar 12, 2012)

That really something new I come to know about micro-plastic fibres... its a threat for sea shores and even for sea organism!!
Was wondering as we do plastic recycling of plastic waste and scrap can we such thing for those micro-plastic fibres, I mean is it possible to recycle them


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## Anne Lyle (Mar 12, 2012)

SamanthaMcquire said:


> Was wondering as we do plastic recycling of plastic waste and scrap can we such thing for those micro-plastic fibres, I mean is it possible to recycle them



I guess the problem is that they're so tiny, how do you collect them?

Since reading that article, I've been making an extra effort to buy natural fibre clothing where possible. It may be a drop in the ocean - so to speak - but if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem.


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## Dave (Mar 12, 2012)

SamanthaMcquire said:


> I mean is it possible to recycle them


These are tiny particle strands. Do we recycle dust? Snowdogs suggestion is unworkable - we don't have a 'plastic detector' and plastic isn't magnetic. We have a choice to stop using plastics, or to live with the consequences. Clearly, plastics are now a part of everyday modern life - from a baby's pacifier to replacement heart valves and bone joints. While it is concerning that they are found inside organisms, is it any more concerning that finding concentrated heavy metals? Is it doing the organisms any harm? These fibres accumulating in Marine environments seem to be exclusively from washing clothes, but can we really return to only using natural fibres?


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## Vertigo (Mar 12, 2012)

> but can we really return to only using natural fibres?


Realistically I doubt we could. However since most are, as you say, from washing clothes, maybe washing machines should have better filters fitted. OK so it would be a hassle but if that's what it takes...


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## Ursa major (Mar 12, 2012)

I don't wish to pour cold water on the article - for obvious reasons (but also because most detergents are not recommended below 25°C ) - but I do get suspicious when I see something is said to be about 80% of a total, because it sounds very like a statistic plucked from thin air, i.e. a call to the spirit of the Pareto principle rather than the output of a solid analysis. And is it 80% by number (which seems ridiculously small), or by weight or by volume? Was the figure extrapolated from a tiny sample or a large one?


And will the situation remain, i.e. will synthesized polymers never be broken down, or will they eventually suffer the fate of natural polymers? (And will this make plastic a less reliable substance in future?)


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## Dave (Mar 12, 2012)

Ursa - I initially thought that is likely another problem with the journalist, rather than the science paper that the research was published in. However, it appears to be more a general dumbing down for us because we are too thick to understand. As I haven't read the paper I can't comment on how the 80% is calculated. Nor can I really knock the journalist either, because if it wasn't for him then we would never have known about it.

I have just clicked on the link to the Journal though, and from there to another link on a paper about sampling techniques for microplastics. There are various methods and it is very complicated and not at all interesting. You can easily see why the BBC would rather just say 80%.

I can see a future where there could be a biological solution to these pollution problems. Farmed marine and aquatic organisms that mop up heavy metals, DDT, microplastics and which can then be harvested, so the contaminant is concentrated within them. Just as long as they don't cause further problems i.e. Neal Stephenson's *Zodiac *.


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## SamanthaMcquire (Mar 13, 2012)

Dave said:


> These are tiny particle strands. Do we recycle dust? Snowdogs suggestion is unworkable - we don't have a 'plastic detector' and plastic isn't magnetic. We have a choice to stop using plastics, or to live with the consequences. Clearly, plastics are now a part of everyday modern life - from a baby's pacifier to replacement heart valves and bone joints. While it is concerning that they are found inside organisms, is it any more concerning that finding concentrated heavy metals? Is it doing the organisms any harm? These fibres accumulating in Marine environments seem to be exclusively from washing clothes, but can we really return to only using natural fibres?



Thanks for giving satisfying answer!!


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