[HN Gopher] Ocean Plastic Emissions by Country
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Ocean Plastic Emissions by Country
Author : nomaxx117
Score : 98 points
Date : 2021-08-14 20:35 UTC (2 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (ourworldindata.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (ourworldindata.org)
| openforce wrote:
| I had read somewhere that a lot of waste(supposedly recyclable)
| from the US ends up in these poorer asian countries. These
| countries that actually don't have a lot invested in high
| efficient recycling systems.
|
| But this article just shows the data where the water gets
| polluted from mismanaged waste. But not where this plastic comes
| from? I suppose it's not the full story then?
| [deleted]
| nomaxx117 wrote:
| I've been reading up on this stuff for a while. Most of the
| waste is actually single use plastics from products consumed in
| the emitting countries, that are disposed of improperly. For
| example, the Philippines has an issue with sachets.
|
| Sources:
|
| https://news.mongabay.com/2018/10/plastic-trash-from-the-sac...
|
| https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/health/article/2168819/philip...
| megablast wrote:
| The number one cause of micro-plastic pollution near waterways is
| from car tires. Just another reason cars are such a detriment to
| our society.
| shadilay wrote:
| Buses and bicycles do not have tires?
| Ndymium wrote:
| Per passenger, buses have far fewer tires. Bicycle tires wear
| down slower than car tires, and are smaller so there is less
| to wear anyway.
| Robotbeat wrote:
| Possibly you're correct about bikes, but I suspect buses
| and cars have similar tire wear per passenger mile, with
| only a slight advantage for buses. Also, rubber
| biodegrades. Brake dust and rail dust are also concerns.
| himinlomax wrote:
| The wear and tear is a function of weight and speed. It's
| also not linear.
| akomtu wrote:
| Cars are also the backbone of our society.
| BurningFrog wrote:
| This quantifies the nonsense of the San Francisco plastic straw
| ban, which was motivated by stopping plastic ocean emissions.
|
| And I still can't get a non melting straw.
| ioseph wrote:
| BYO metal or bamboo straw?
| spikels wrote:
| I guess those plastic straw bans in the US and Europe won't be
| solving plastic pollution in oceans.
| Zenst wrote:
| Alas much plastic gets bundled up as `recycling` and brought up
| cheap and hands washed and pats on the back. Sadly that then
| goes onto some landfill in Africa or Asia and tada...blame
| shifted and politicians gets to say how well they are tackling
| things by being seen to be doing things.
|
| Plastic recycling from Europe is being dumped in Asian waters -
| https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/06/200630103603.h...
| nomaxx117 wrote:
| As the article discusses, the main contributing factor is a lack
| of effective waste disposal systems, almost entirely in low and
| middle income countries. The US, for example contributes .25% of
| global ocean plastic emissions (not the 4.5% from all of NA, most
| of which is from Central America and the Caribbean). High income
| countries can help low income countries develop these systems
| through grants and subsidies.
| bufferoverflow wrote:
| There are also bad cultures that find it acceptable to just
| throw any trash into a river.
| mistrial9 wrote:
| "blame transfer" ? How about "put your trash in a trash system,
| not the river" instead of guilting out the readers here? In
| other news, local government takes money meant for trash
| disposal and uses it for other things.
| dfee wrote:
| The article's title is "Where does the plastic in our oceans come
| from?", and HN lists it as "Ocean Plastic Emissions by Country".
| Indeed, one section is titled "Which countries emit the most
| plastic to the ocean?".
|
| Don't let any of that fool you. We never actually get a breakdown
| of contribution by country in the extensive article. I'm not sure
| why.
| nomaxx117 wrote:
| The map interactive does provide that information if you roll
| over the countries.
| burlesona wrote:
| Because the article is considered a "summary" of the raw data
| you can explore yourself, including the breakdown for each
| country.
| asdfasgasdgasdg wrote:
| I don't think anyone is trying to fool you. The data is there
| for you to look at if you're interested.
| lallysingh wrote:
| "Most of the world's largest emitting rivers are in Asia, with
| some also in East Africa and the Caribbean. In the chart we see
| the ten largest contributors. This is shown as each river's share
| of the global total. You can explore the data on the top 50
| rivers using the +Add river button on the chart.6
|
| Seven of the top ten rivers are in the Philippines. Two are in
| India, and one in Malaysia. The Pasig River in the Philippines
| alone accounts for 6.4% of global river plastics. This paints a
| very different picture to earlier studies where it was Asia's
| largest rivers - the Yangtze, Xi, and Huangpu rivers in China,
| and Ganges in India - that were dominant."
| manachar wrote:
| Wonder if this is connected to China ceasing to accept
| trash/recycling from the US.
|
| I really hate that recycling became essentially a for-profit
| shell game of shipping it somewhere else to be a problem rather
| than dealing with building the domestic infrastructure needed
| to correctly handle it (including not overselling recycling so
| we could get waste-to-energy plants as part of the mix).
| nomaxx117 wrote:
| It could have some small connection, but I would probably
| guess (based of of general trends) that it has to do with
| some regions or cities not yet having adequate waste disposal
| systems.
| nomaxx117 wrote:
| The massive concentration in the Philippines is one of the most
| interesting takeaways here. I ended up poking around for more
| details on this, and it looks like the causes relate to, among
| other things, a lack of proper waste disposal and an industry
| reliance on plastic sachets for food packaging.
|
| Sources:
| https://www.scmp.com/lifestyle/health/article/2168819/philip...
|
| https://news.mongabay.com/2018/10/plastic-trash-from-the-sac...
|
| https://urban-links.org/insight/turning-the-tide-on-ocean-pl...
| pyaamb wrote:
| The Ocean Cleanup Project is doing good work and could probably
| use some scaling up
|
| https://theoceancleanup.com/updates/in-search-of-the-rivers-...
| shadilay wrote:
| It is infinitely more efficient to just not dump plastic in the
| ocean in the first place than it is pick it out of the ocean.
| pyaamb wrote:
| Indeed
| screye wrote:
| Wow, growing up in India I always knew that the Mithi Nadi
| (ulhas) was incredibly polluted and trash filled. But, to see it
| at rank 3 is really eye opening.
|
| There have been efforts over the last few decades to clean it up.
| But, Mumbai slums are situated on the river, and dump everything
| and anything into it. It would be nice to know if the Ulhas is
| mostly polluted with plastic upstream or at the mouth near
| Mumbai.
| nomaxx117 wrote:
| You might be able to get answers in the "Figures and Data" tab
| of this page:
|
| https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/7/18/eaaz5803
| sschueller wrote:
| North America is 4.5%. That is just shameful and inexcusable for
| a non 3rd world country. The US needs to get their trash disposal
| in check and I hope the infrastructure bill has something in it
| to get away from open landfills to more modern methods such as
| cleanly incinerating garbage. Banning plastic bags at the grocery
| store and straws at the bar is also not going to solve this
| issue.
| lisper wrote:
| It is far from obvious whether the best strategy is for the
| U.S. to clean up its 4.5% contribution, or to use those same
| resources to help the Philippines clean up their vastly larger
| share.
| pengaru wrote:
| why are they mutually exclusive?
| lisper wrote:
| Because even the U.S. does not have infinite resources.
| pengaru wrote:
| Why does it require infinite resources?
| [deleted]
| wongarsu wrote:
| The best strategy imho would be to split resources and do
| both. Helping far-off countries without cleaning up your own
| backyard would seem condescending and like an attempt to
| shift all blame elsewhere. Starting an effort to clean up
| ocean pollution originating from the US while simultaneously
| helping Asian countries do the same appears much more genuine
| and has a much better chance to work based on perception
| alone.
| anyfoo wrote:
| That's actually a really good point. While I do think that
| a larger share of effort and goodwill should be spent on
| major pollution _first_ (and helping with cleanup and
| implementation of proper waste management there), not doing
| anything in your own backyard at the same time seems
| hypocritical.
| nomaxx117 wrote:
| We do not have a 4.5% contribution, most of the NA
| contribution (as shown in the linked data) comes from Central
| America and the Caribbean. We contribute .25%.
| mc32 wrote:
| North America here refers to the whole N. American continent
| including the isthmus of Central America and the archipelagos
| of the Caribbean Seas.
|
| The US is responsible for one half of one percent which is
| pretty good.
| anyfoo wrote:
| While I think I agree with the straws and plastic bags (it's
| hard without actual data), I do wonder whether reducing plastic
| packaging on a large scale would not have a significant effect
| as well.
|
| Close to a decade ago I moved from Europe to the US. I did, and
| continue to do, perceive how much more plastics my groceries
| are packaged with. This is especially egregious for things that
| you buy in bundles, where each individual item is wrapped in
| plastics again. Also, cheese for example seems to be packaged
| with plastics a lot more than, say, paper.
|
| In order to solve the problem, it's probably more important and
| effective to address the larger sources first, though.
| Prioritization.
| syshum wrote:
| >Also, cheese for example seems to be packaged with plastics
| a lot more than, say, paper.
|
| Sorry you are not taking my individually wrapped cheese
| single slices
| kortilla wrote:
| North America is not a country.
| seriousquestion wrote:
| North America <> US
|
| And when you are solving a problem, do you sort by % ascending
| or descending?
| Overton-Window wrote:
| The US alone is 4.25% of world population:
| https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/us-population...
|
| Focusing on curbing emissions regionally is as futile as
| instating a "no peeing" section of the pool.
| [deleted]
| nomaxx117 wrote:
| So, there is some interesting data on this in the data. Most of
| the North American waste comes from central America and the
| Carribean. The US and Canada combined are responsible for .27%
| of global plastic emission. Guatamala emits .73%, Panama emits
| .53%, Haiti .71%, and the Dominican Republic .64%.
|
| Banning plastic bags won't do anything here. This is about
| countries not having sufficient waste disposal systems. If you
| want to have an impact on this, don't push for bans on plastic
| bags and other single use plastics. Donate to NGOs that help
| build new waste management systems in affected countries and
| push for federal grants to such organizations (if in the US).
|
| As a side note, SUP bans actually have a number of unintended
| negative consequences, and it is not clear that they are even a
| net positive for the environment. Depending on who you ask, the
| environmental impact of such bans ranges from significant to
| marginal, and CO2 emissions from plastic bags is likely far
| better than alternatives.
|
| Source for C02 claim:
| https://news.climate.columbia.edu/2020/04/30/plastic-paper-c...
| OrvalWintermute wrote:
| I know the context is ocean pollution and my response is very
| anecdotal, and local watershed. Since the County & State put
| additional costs on plastic bags, the amount of them strewn
| all over the local parks, and the key creek in our area has
| dropped dramatically.
|
| I still do see plastic bottles mainly from water, and
| aluminum cans both for soda and beer, but not much else.
| nomaxx117 wrote:
| These actions do reduce litter, but most ocean emission is
| the result of a complete lack of waste disposal systems.
| The quantities involved are always far larger in situations
| where a very large portion of waste is simply dumped into a
| river.
| architect64 wrote:
| At first I thought the same, but their North American dataset
| includes countries in Central America and the Caribbean. The US
| does a relatively good job within its borders, but could do
| more to support waste management efforts in less wealthy
| countries.
|
| https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/ocean-plastic-waste-per-c...
| burlesona wrote:
| Your comment mistakenly conflates North America with the United
| States. The US is only 0.25%. North America includes Mexico,
| Central America, and the Caribbean. Of those, Guatemala appears
| to be the "leader" at 0.73%, approx 3 times more waste than the
| US despite having about 1/20 the population.
| akomtu wrote:
| NA could make a heavy duty zero maintenance plastic disposal
| box. Powered by solar panels, ideally. Then give them for
| free to countries that don't have recycling facilities.
| lhorie wrote:
| One thing to be aware of though is all these numbers are in
| the 0.x% range per country, making it easy to draw "eh we're
| not so bad" type of conclusions.
|
| But consider visualizing it like this: if the entire amount
| of ocean pollution was represented by a 10x10x10 pile of
| tires, 2.5 tires would be of American origin. So while not
| completely embarrassing, it's not exactly great either.
|
| Considering there are some 200 countries in world, 0.x%
| contribution is within the same order of magnitude to the
| average contribution.
|
| So although some countries have more slack to pick up, I
| think the alarmist tone about US isn't necessarily
| unwarranted.
| nsizx wrote:
| And to think that the EU made it mandatory for plastic bags to
| cost money, gravely inconveniencing every shopper... And my
| country only amounts to 0.02% of plastic waste in the ocean.
| thepasswordis wrote:
| I don't know that I would consider not having a plastic bag a
| "grave" inconvenience.
| Majestic121 wrote:
| Gravely inconveniencing, really? Adding 40 cents to your bill
| if you forgot your shopping bag is a grave inconvenience?
| nsizx wrote:
| Actually yes, since some shops now only have paper bags which
| are expensive and break just by looking at them. If you
| forget to bring a bag from home you're in trouble, especially
| if your groceries are heavy and you're far from home - the
| bags are guaranteed to break. (This is Europe, so you're
| walking back, obviously)
| ginko wrote:
| Paper bags are actually sturdier than plastic bags from my
| experience.
| redisman wrote:
| I'm glad your life is so easy that this is riling you up
| hh3k0 wrote:
| Yeah, whoever thinks that adding 40 cents to your bill for
| forgetting your shopping bag is a "grave inconvenience" was
| raised a spoiled brat. Plain and simple. The bar for
| something to be a "grave inconvenience" isn't high if you've
| never known of real hardship, I guess.
| hh3k0 wrote:
| Yeah, let's just all sit back and carry on business as usual
| while pointing fingers at whoever is the worst offender at the
| moment. That sounds like a good idea.
| nomaxx117 wrote:
| Yeah, SUP bans don't do anything for the ocean. Investment in
| waste management solutions in low and middle income countries
| is far better for the environment, but most politicians are not
| terribly well informed.
| freyr wrote:
| You can buy a bag for a few cents or bring a bag.
|
| You're living life on easy street if this is what you consider
| "gravely inconveniencing."
| nsizx wrote:
| Everything has to be read in context. This is gravely
| inconveniencing to the experience of shopping. Sorry I didn't
| get to work in the salt mines!
| catillac wrote:
| Still, it's hard to imagine how one might ever consider
| such a small inconvenience "gravely inconveniencing" even
| in that very specific context. It's such a small thing. I
| don't think one has to have worked in the salt mines to
| think this.
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(page generated 2021-08-14 23:00 UTC)