Plastic oceans

Plastic pollution is a gigantic problem. Our beaches and waters are littered with plastic, marine life ingests it or gets ensnared and particles are entering our food web and organisms. Microplastics are everywhere now.

More and more alternatives to plastics are being proposed these days, as the world wakes up to the immense “longevity” of single-use plastics.

One of these alternatives—seaweed—is the focus of Notpla, a London-based startup that has developed packaging that is designed to be composted, dissolved or consumed after use.

The decision to use seaweed was made after considering that it was abundant, grew fast, sequestered carbon from the air and did not require pesticides.

The popular dive spot is southeast of the Philippine capital, Manila.

BBC Philippine correspondent Howard Johnson joined dive professionals from Anilao Scuba Dive Centre as they resumed diving, following the national lockdown. The dive centre is affiliated to the United Nations Environment Programme’s Green Fins, which promotes sustainable marine tourism in South-East Asia.

A new study conducted at the Norwegian Institute for Air Research suggests wind-borne microplastics are a bigger source of ocean pollution than rivers, the route that has attracted most attention to date.

To understand sea turtle behavior around ocean plastics, the research team compared how sea turtles in a lab setting reacted to smelling odors of turtle food, ocean-soaked plastic, clean plastic and water.

The turtles ignored the scents of clean plastic and water, but responded to the odors of food and ocean-soaked plastics by showing foraging behavior. This included poking their noses out of the water repeatedly as they tried to smell the food source, and increasing their activity as they searched.