Subject: Re: Abandoned Gill Nets (fishing line too!)
Date: Dec 29 16:35:59 1997
From: Michael Price - mprice at mindlink.bc.ca


Hi Tweets,

Kelly Cassidy writes:

>Where would you put it once
>you've got it?

Are there no industrial recyclers of plastic? (Are there no prisons? Are
there no workhouses? '-)

>And, more to the point, how do you stop the accumulation
>of oceanic trash?

Easy! The same way we stop the accumulation of terrestrial trash: we don't.
We just try to minimise it in variously simultaneus ways: some education,
some moral suasion, some incentives, some enforcement--say through fines,
positive financial incentives, donations perhaps, making it more economical
to a) not do it; b) do it, but pick up after oneself; c) pick up after
others. Then there's volunteers, as Kelly suggested. Then maybe there's
programs set up at the national and international agency level. As big as
this problem sounds, it doesn't sound like there's any intrinsic reason it
couldn't be reduced to manageable levels, lessening its effects on oceanic life.

By the way, what effect does all this crud have on the reflectivity of the
ocean's surface? Enough for macroclimatic change? Is there enough to
constitute a factor in climate modelling?

Michael Price A brave world, Sir,
Vancouver BC Canada full of religion, knavery and change;
mprice at mindlink.net we shall shortly see better days.
Aphra Behn (1640-1689)