Saving Seafood

More plastic than fish in oceans by 2050

January 19, 2016 — The world is flooded with plastic garbage.

There will be more plastic than fish in terms of weight in the world’s oceans by 2050, the World Economic Forum warned Tuesday.

Plastic has become one of the world’s most popular materials, combining amazing functionality and very low production costs. Its use has increased 20-fold in the past 50 years and is expected to double again in the next 20 years.

Almost everybody in the world comes into contact with it — over a quarter of all plastic is used for packaging, the most popular use of the material.

But only 14% of plastic packaging is collected for recycling. The reuse rate is terrible compared to other materials — 58% of paper and up to 90% of iron and steel gets recycled.

It gets worse. Almost a third of all plastic packaging escapes collection systems and ends up in nature or clogging up infrastructure.

Read the full story at CNN Money at KCRA

 

Aquaculture on the rise in coastal North Carolina

October 22, 2015 — NEW HANOVER COUNTY, N.C. – Nearly all of southeastern North Carolina’s waters are now open for shellfish harvesting after heavy rains and floods left most areas polluted earlier this month.

Not only are oysters one of the state’s most popular shellfish to eat, but the shells themselves can be used as hardworking landscape material, in the form of driveways and patios.

Oyster shells make up many of the paths at Colonial Williamsburg to to get around. But starting October 1, a new law went into effect prohibiting contractors from using the shells in commercial landscaping.

The new law is an effort to increase the state’s oyster shell recycling program, where the shells are used to rebuilt oyster reefs.

“Oysters happen to be one of the few species that when we harvest it, we take the habitat right along with it, so we are trying to put that back into place,” said UNC-Wilmington’s Troy Alphin. “Larvae oysters depend on the adult oyster shell for settlement, and they have a very narrow window for settlement in their life span, only a couple of weeks. So if the shells are not in the water, they are not available for the larvae to settle on, these larvae will die. What we are trying to do is make sure the shells are back in the water as soon as we can they will be available for the next generation of oysters.”

At a summit earlier this year, North Carolina ecologists, scientists and politicians announced new efforts to make North Carolina the “Napa Valley of Oysters.”  One way that can be accomplished is by developing new oyster sanctuaries, something that Virginia and other states have already done.

A healthy oyster population is linked to the overall health of coastal fisheries.

Read the full story at WECT6

 

Recycling old fishing nets is catchy concept

August 23, 2015 — A Bay State native’s upcycling firm is turning discarded fishing nets — a significant source of ocean pollution — into skateboards and sunglasses, with the backing of the New England Aquarium.

“We had been all around the world and we had seen the global issue of ocean pollution,” Buero Inc. co-founder Ben R. Kneppers said, adding that fishing nets account for about 10 percent of marine pollution. “We wanted to see if we could create an innovative solution to prevent this material from entering the ocean.”

Patagonia has partnered with Kneppers and his partners, David M. Stover and Kevin J. Ahearn, to put the “Minnow” skateboard on the shelves of more than 90 stores across five continents, and the skateboards are now available for purchase in the aquarium gift shop as well.

The company, based in Chile, started two years ago and Kneppers said the New England Aquarium and Northeastern University, his alma matter, were two of the biggest initial backers.

Read the full story at the Boston Herald