Ocean Pollution

What is your disturbance?

Ocean pollution.
How is it caused?
Humans are the main cause of ocean pollution. Oil spills, littering, ocean
mining, and agricultural and industrial waste are some harmful human
effects. The biggest pollutant is plastic waste.
Where in the world is this disturbance most commonly seen?
While many oceans are highly polluted, the Mediterranean Sea is the
most polluted ocean in the world.
How does it impact biodiversity? What are the other consequences?
Ocean pollution kills many different marine plants and animals,
sometimes killing off entire species. This decreases biodiversity.
Another consequence of ocean pollution is that when a fish ingests
plastic or toxins, it can often end up on our plates. Us humans eat those
toxins or plastics that can become imbedded in human tissue. This can
cause long-term health problems, birth defects, and cancer.
If you were in charge of solving this ecosystem disturbance problem,
what would you do?
If I oversaw solving this problem, I would create a set of laws. These
laws would first halt all plastic production. Then, in places where there
is lots of floating trash, I would have it all collected. All collected
plastics would then be reused/remade into different plastic items people
could use. The next law I would create would be that everyone has a
limit of plastic items they can buy/have every year. They are not allowed
to exceed that limit. Next, I would make it so anyone who does not
recycle personal trash, (water bottles, candy wrappers, etc.) will be
fined. (Yes, that may sound strict, but we have a planet to save, so
toughen up.) We can have said trash and recycling checked as parts of
community service. Soon, we will need no more plastic production
because ALL recycling is repurposed.
What are the pros and cons to your solution?
The pros of this solution are that this will help stop ocean pollution, stop
killing organisms, and save biodiversity. The cons of this solution are
that it will take many years to adapt to the cycle of reusing all plastics. It
will take a long time to create this clean earth. Another con is that not all
the work to be done can be community service. It will be more work for
others and more money going towards paying people to enforce the laws
and do the service. Another con is the cost of education of informing
people about he laws and educating people on doing these jobs.
Do you think people would be easily convinced to adopt your solution?
Why or why not?
Unfortunately, I do not think people will be easily convinced to adopt
my solution. My solution requires lots of services, time, and energy.
Lots of people have the mindset that pollution is too far gone so what’s
the point? It takes a lot to understand that it is never too late to start
helping our earth. If we act now, it will majorly affect our world in the
future. I’m sure lots of people think that it would just be ‘easier’ to
continue this pollutant lifestyle. We must break the pollution cycle and
strengthen the cycle of well, recycling.

Sources cited:
New Study Finds Ocean Pollution a Threat to Human Health.
How Ocean Pollution Impacts Marine Life—and All of Us.
Ocean Pollution: Causes, Effects and Prevention
How Does Water Pollution Affect Fish?

And here is a picture of my poster board. Our neighbors at the end of our
road always do big garage sales and this weekend is City-wide Garage
Sale Weekend so I am going to put the sign at the end of our gate so
everybody can see it 😊