The “Great Pacific Garbage Patch”, accumulating in what is known as the north pacific subtropical gyre and said to be floating between California and Japan, is not nearly as big as it has been made out to be, a scientist for Oregon State University (www.uoregon.edu) in the US claims – see Plasteurope.com of 25.08.2009. According to university researcher Angelicque White, the “hypothetically cohesive patch” of debris often described as being “twice the size of Texas” is only about 1% of the geographic area of the US state that measures 696,200 square kilometres.

Contrary to widely circulated statements, the oceans contain more plankton than plastics and the patch is not growing as fast as believed, White adds, basing her claims both on scientific literature and her participation in one of the expeditions funded by the US National Science Foundation through the Center for Microbial Oceanography: Research and Education (C-More). Taking issue with the “hyperbole about plastic patches,” she argues that although “there is no doubt that the amount of plastics in the world’s oceans is troubling, this kind of exaggeration undermines the credibility of scientists.”

In the report published in the first week of 2011, the university researcher points out that recent research by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in the US state of Massachusetts found that “the amount of plastic, at least in the Atlantic ocean, has not increased since the mid-1980s – despite greater production and consumption.” In a report last year, the US organisation Ocean Conservancy, which is also conducting studies in the Pacific, also took issue with public misconception, saying that the size of the debris conglomeration is “impossible to measure,” as it is fluid.

Both White and Ocean Conservancy point out that it will be difficult and costly to remove the debris, especially as some of it has sunk to the ocean floor. During her recent expedition, White also says she discovered that photosynthetic microbes and “other aquatic creatures,” some of which may be beneficial to the ecosystem, were living on the surface of plastic particles. While other oceanography research groups have been testing clean-up methods that would have a low impact on marine life, the Oregon scientist insists the focus should be less on removing plastics from the oceans than preventing waste in the first place.