Scientists make troubling discovery in rain falling over portion of US
Scientists recently found microscopic bits of plastic in the rain that fell over the Rocky Mountains. It was found in nearly 90% of all the samples tested.
Plastic has become more than just a part of humans' daily lives; it’s now a part of the environment. Scientists in two very different places have made similar, startling observations in precipitation that demonstrate how plastic is finding its way into every facet of life on the planet.
In the Rocky Mountains, United States Geological Survey (USGS) scientists took samples of rainwater and accidentally found particles of microplastics. They originally had set out to analyze the samples to study rainwater for nitrogen pollution levels. Instead, they found something much more tragic.
According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), microplastics are pieces of plastic debris that are less than 5 millimeters in length. NOAA explains that microplastics, microbeads and microfibers pose a dangerous threat to aquatic life.
If these particles are ingested or marine wildlife get entangled in them, the plastics can cause injury, alter behaviors and drastically impact important populations. This could throw the balance of the entire ecosystem off kilter.
In this June 18, 2019, file photo, a plastic recycling company worker sorts out plastic bottles collected for processing at Tokyo Petbottle Recycle Co., Ltd, in Tokyo. Japan has a plastic problem. Single bananas here are sometimes wrapped in plastic. So are individual pieces of vegetables, fruit, pastries, pens and cosmetics. Plastic-wrapped plastic spoons come with every ice cream cup. But as world leaders descend on Osaka for the two-day G20 Summit that starts Friday, June 28, Japan has ambitions to become a world leader in reducing plastic waste. (AP Photo/Koji Sasahara, File)
Sherri Mason, who studies the impacts of microplastics at Penn State University's Behrend campus, told The Guardian that microscopic plastics break off articles of clothing every time they are washed, which then get incorporated into water droplets before eventually getting flushed into large bodies of water.
Once in the water, the microplastics can be transported around the world in many different ways, such as environmental winds or rain clouds. While finding these particles in large cities or popularly populated areas has long been known, finding them in unpopulated areas has been a shock to researchers.
The spread of these particles has become so wide that they have even reached the food we eat and water we drink.
A study conducted by the University of Newcastle found that people consume an average of five grams of plastic per week, just in the foods and beverages they consume. The same study also found that the largest source of plastic ingestion comes from drinking water, with plastic being found in water (groundwater, surface water, tap water and bottled water) all over the world.
Microburst in the western United States
Perhaps most striking, samples taken from unpopulated areas of the Arctic have even yielded the same results in snowfall accumulations.
In a study published by Science Advances, researchers found that a "substantial" concentration of microplastics and microfibers was found in samples taken from ice floes in Fram Strait. The Fram Strait is an unpopulated expanse of ocean between Greenland and Svalbard, Norway.
The Arctic study compared microplastic levels from samples taken in remote, snowy locations versus populated sites around Europe. While the concentration levels were lower in the Arctic, the researchers still considered the amount to be considerable.
The authors of the study offered numerous possibilities for why the microplastic levels would be as high as they are in the Arctic, despite the low population there. Some of those reasons, such as wind and ships, indicate a strong possibility that "most of the particles likely originate from more distant regions."
Melanie Bregman, the lead author of the study, has been researching the impact of plastics on the ocean floor for the past 17 years. Her findings in the Arctic may have answered one of her scarier questions: Does the environment itself transport these microplastics to places previously unexpected?
"We expected to find some contamination but to find this many microplastics was a real shock," Bregman told BBC News. "It's readily apparent that the majority of the microplastic in the snow comes from the air."
In this Monday, Aug. 12, 2019 photo a dog walks past plastic waste in a public park in Berlin, Germany. (AP Photo/Michael Sohn)
In the Rockies, where researchers hadn't even set out to find microplastics, the particles were found in nearly 90 percent of samples. The main belief from all the different studies is that the plastic pieces and shards are so prevalent throughout the environment as a result of improperly disposed human waste.
The wide variety of different colors of plastic and the location of the rain samples, in the mountains, also made the discoveries noteworthy. The prevalence of microplastics in the Rockies, another largely unpopulated area, indicates the probability of factors like wind playing a larger role than most anticipated.
Gregory Wetherbee, one of the USGS researchers involved with the discovery, told The Guardian that he never expected to find such a large amount of plastics in the samples.
“I guess I expected to see mostly soil and minerals,” Wetherbee said. “My results are purely accidental.”
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