In national parks and nature conservation areas in the West of the United Staatenwie Grand Canyon, Rocky Mountain and Joshua Tree, researchers have found more micro plastic than previously suspected. More than 1,000 tons of such particles were an estimated each year alone, reports the scientists working with Janice Brahney from Utah State University in the journal “Science”. This corresponds to around bottles 123 million plastic water.
“We were shocked by the rates of the estimated Displacement, and have always tried to find a way, where we had miscalculated,” said Brahney. All the Checks have confirmed the estimates, but. The total area of the areas of 496.350 square kilometers, calculated the mean in the means 132 registered particles per square meter of the day. As a micro-plastic particles with a diameter of five millimeters. Such tiny particles have been detected in snow, food and drinking water.
Alone in Denver, the state of Enver cause agreed that each of the approximately 330 million inhabitants every day, about 340 grams of plastic waste, the scientists write. This ends up partly in the nature, and breaks down slowly into ever smaller components. The micro-plastic particles end up in our rivers and lakes, the sea, the soil and the atmosphere. Brahney and her Team had collected over 14 months in national parks and nature conservation areas in the West of the United States, regularly samples and the origin and composition of the particles studied.
it was generated originally from cities or populated areas, and were spread over the waters further. A portion of the particles had been registered about the atmosphere in the rain – you were so small that they would be transported across continents. Most of the micro-plastic went back on items of clothing and industrial materials. A third tribe, probably of industrial paints and glazes, according to the researchers. Because white and transparent particles had not been counted, could be the estimation values even under the actual quantities entered.
Unfortunately, it is no Surprise that to find even in remote and protected places like national parks plastic particles are commented Bernhard Bauske, an expert on plastic waste in the WWF Germany, the analysis. Micro-plastic is everywhere: “It pollutes the air we breathe, the food we eat and the water we drink.” Also in Germany, plastic pollution was a big Problem: 330,000 tons of micro-plastic were in this country every year into the environment.
researchers had estimated in an analysis last year that people consume through diet alone, annually, 40,000 to 50,000 plastic particles. The uptake by Inhalation is not included. Whether this is associated with health risks, it is so far unclear. Experts believe that such inflammatory reactions is possible. Critical also is the with the particles and captured chemical substances such as herbicides, insecticides, or plasticizers therefore to see.
