Celia Blankenship

English 1201

Professor Morean

23 March 2020

Literature Review

In what ways is plastic pollution changing the world around us and how can we fix it?

The five sources identified all have similar thoughts on plastic pollution. These sources show

how the environment is affected by pollution caused by plastics and how this is also affecting

mankind. All of the sources are very similar in the fact that they are against pollution with

plastics but I have one source that provides a way that plastics could also benefit the

environment.

One source I found particularly interesting was the website from the Environmental

Protection Agency (EPA) This website has many tabs you can click on to see what you can be

doing in your everyday life to prevent our waters from becoming highly polluted. From this site

they even show the multiple projects and initiatives that the EPA has funded to reduce the

amount of trash in the water ways. It helps to know what you can do at home to stop this

problem at the source. This website is truly safe to use in my article because it is from the EPA

itself.

The website that taught more about the cause was from the National History Museum. It

goes into more of the problems that meet the eye. There are more descriptions of each and every

issue with pollution in the waterways than what is told to the world. There are specific plastics

that are doing the most damage to our environment such as microbeads which you can find in
your face wash. What I like most about this website is that through each paragraph, if there is

something that you do not know or understand there is a link to another section of their website

that will provide a plethora of information. This website is from the National History Museum

which leads me to believe that the information within is liable and can be put to good use.

The one difference in all of the five articles and websites found is that in the article

written by the ornithologist and scientist who goes by “GrrlScientist” is that she wrote about the

fact that plastic could also be helping our environment as well. GrrlScientist explains that

methane gas is far more responsible for the environment's problems than plastic. GrrlScientist

believes that since there are items we have had all along that are made of plastic, like our

toothbrushes and hairbrushes, that we need to focus more attention on the methane gas problem.

Another difference among the writings is from Martin C. M. Blettler and Linda Finska.

They don't really recall the plastics and how they are hurting the ecosystem but their focus is

more on the logistics of it all. Linda writes about the pollution’s travel throughout the water

system and how not just the animals are being affected but the humans are being affected as well.

She speaks of ways to understand the water systems to prevent much loss of marine life. Martin

C. M. Blettler writes more on the side of how freshwater environments are being affected as well

as the marine environments yet people rarely make a big deal about the life in freshwater.

Throughout all five of these websites and articles you can see that there is a common

sense of how the plastics are harming the environment but they all have something to add such as

how to help prevent this, how to spread the word about recycling, and even shows that some

people might be making too big of a deal about plastics. Altogether these articles will work
together in this research paper nicely to show the world how to see what plastics are doing to life

on earth and how to help.

 Works Cited

Blettler, Martín C. M., et al. “Freshwater Plastic Pollution: Recognizing Research Biases

and Identifying Knowledge Gaps.” ​Water Research​, vol. 143, Oct. 2018, pp. 416–424.
EBSCOhost​, doi:10.1016/j.watres.2018.06.015.

Finska, Linda, and Julie Gjørtz Howden. “Troubled Waters – Where Is the Bridge?

Confronting Marine Plastic Pollution from International Watercourses.” ​Review of

European Comparative & International Environmental Law​, vol. 27, no. 3, Nov. 2018,

pp. 245–253. ​EBSCOhost,​ doi:10.1111/reel.12257.

GrrlScientist. “Five Ways That Plastics Harm The Environment

(And One Way They May Help).” Forbes Magazine, 24 Apr. 2018,

www.forbes.com/sites/grrlscientist/2018/04/23/five-ways-that-plastics-harm-the-environ

ment-and-one-way-they-may-help/#12d88efc67a0​.

“How Much Plastic Is in the Ocean?” ​Natural History Museum​,

www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/quick-questions/how-much-plastic-is-in-the-ocean.html​.

“Trash-Free Waters.”, Environmental Protection Agency, 14 Jan. 2020,

www.epa.gov/trash-free-waters​.