This morning I listened to an informative and inspiring podcast episode by the Plastisphere which described the relationship between plastic pollution and climate change (I highly recommend you give it a listen and follow the podcast). It was eloquently stated at the end of the podcast that “climate change and plastic pollution are two sides of the same coin” which is something to keep in mind as scientists, environmental advocates, consumers and just plain old human beings in general. The episode inspired me to write about our need for development in plastic research, while the media is booming with posts about microplastics and nanoplastics, the science is still behind when compared to climate change and I would like to know why. We need to think outside the box, but not in the sense of reinventing the wheel. We should use the tools we already have and adapt them to fit the problem at hand.

Should we focus on plastics or greenhouse gas emissions?

While the scientists and environmental advocates in this episode started their research journey in the world of plastic pollution and moved to greenhouse gas emissions, I had the opposite experience. My master’s program was called “Climate Science and Solutions” and it was really the “solutions” part of the name that was most important to me. When I moved to Naples, Italy to start my Ph.D. in ecological modeling and valuation of ecosystem services, I somehow stumbled upon an article describing microplastics and their potential influence on net ecosystem production. I knew at that moment that my next research adventure had to be focused on microplastic impacts at the ecosystem scale because it became clear to me that the microplastic problem lacks solutions due to the complexity of the topic paired with the lack of standardization. I thought, maybe, I could be of use in this area of study. It turns out, also, that this area of study is in line with my previous research objectives. For example, low-density polyethylene, one of the most abundant types of plastic used for packaging, produces CH4 when it degrades, which happens to be a stronger GHG than CO2 (read about this finding here). So it looks like plastic pollution also contributes to GHG emissions and I am still fighting the same fight that I was before, just from a different angle.

The podcast also talks about how the media is full of articles regarding the impact of plastic pollution on the oceans and seas, whereas scientists agree that the bigger threat to these ecosystems is climate change. Yes, there is so much media focus on plastic right now, and it makes sense, you can actually see plastic. As Greta Thunberg has suggested, maybe GHG emissions would cease if people could actually see the CO2, CH4, and N2O floating around in our crystal clear, blue skies. Maybe if we could see GHGs, they would be in the media headlines, too? That being said, however, after my first year of literature review in my current research I have noticed that there is a HUGE lack of standardization in the microplastics area of study, especially when compared to research related to climate change. Maybe the media gets the attention of society, but good and sound science are what allows us to really understand, and hopefully solve problems.

There is a need for GOOD science!

I really can’t stress this point enough, and I will be extremely redundant with it. Sorry, not sorry. When I say we need good science, I am not saying that the effort is not good enough or the techniques are not good enough or that scientists aren’t smart enough. These would all be insults to me as well, I’ve devoted my life to science. What I am saying is that as the problems become more complex, the need for following the annoying and tedious rules that we learn in our university chemistry and physics labs for quality control is more important than ever before. Each time an environmental scientist goes out for sampling offers a new opportunity to obtain useful data for the entire scientific community. It is also, unfortunately, offers an opportunity to introduce too much error or too much uncertainty for that data to be useful for modeling purposes.

But do we really need models?

Yes. We are looking at global environmental problems here. One research group can’t possibly sample every square meter of the planet by itself. In fact, one research group likely can’t even sample every square meter of an ecosystem of interest, at least not fast enough. Models help us because we don’t have time to take samples on every surface of the planet. We also shouldn’t be using resources that add more stress to the environment to conduct these studies.

Either we provide quality data that modelers can use or we sample every square meter of the planet. That may seem extreme, and I am exaggerating a bit, but the point is that if I go to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and say, “I found a dead fish in the Mediterranean Sea near the port of Napoli with a stomach full of plastic, so I sampled the sediment, seawater, and some other biota within a 10 meter radius, analyzed the samples, and found that they too contain plastic (microplastics). I believe it is safe to say that we need to ban plastics to save this type of fish” they will NOT ban plastic production. Why? Because it is impossible to draw a conclusion about the Mediterranean Sea from one dead fish and one 10 meter radius sample area. There are so many factors involved in that fish’s death and the accumulation of plastic in its stomach.

The direct and indirect causes of an animal’s death or the degradation of an ecosystem can be better understood by gathering enough data about the ecosystem as a whole and finding many more fish with the exact same variables acting against them, but this is time-consuming and not efficient at all. On the other hand, by using the amazing computational tools we have called models that help us predict the likeliness of variables to act on a particular species within an ecosystem and how this might be reflected throughout that ecosystem we can draw reasonable and meaningful conclusions that just might convince decision-makers to start approving policy which improves waste management or reduces unnecessary production of plastic. The catch is that models require quality data inputs if they are to provide meaningful results.

Addressing climate change vs. addressing microplastics.

In terms of accumulating GHG emissions data and presenting this data, there are beautifully structured protocols in place. The development of these protocols and the ability for scientists to investigate the increase in global temperature is largely thanks to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The IPCC has been around since 1988 and has since provided incredibly valuable prediction models for decision-makers to help those in policy and the general public understand the consequences of our behavior on the environment. Their models have developed over the years due to the accumulation of a plethora of data coming from a variety of credible sources. From Antarctic ice core samples to satellite data. The data received, though, is standardized and the units are easily converted which is crucial when comparing one piece of data to another because every unit conversion you make introduces more error.

There is not yet an Intergovernmental Panel on Plastic Pollution, although the UN did say that they have plans to develop a panel in January of 2018 so I assume they are still gathering experts. There is however the Joint Group of Experts on the Scientific Aspects of Marine Environmental Protection (GESAMP), which has worked diligently to create guidelines for monitoring and assessing plastic pollution and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) which is in the process of demonstrating the marine plastic footprint using life cycle assessment + a plastic pollution indicator.

GESAMP has been around since 1969 and the study of microplastics started growing in interest in the year 2000. We still just can’t understand what the ecological implications of plastic pollution are. Why is that? The science has developed so much! We can see microplastics (MPs) and characterize them by size, shape, polymer type, and color. We can make educated guesses about where the plastic is coming from and where it will probably end up. Why, then, can we not figure out what they are doing to marine ecosystems?

Many scientists agree that a lack of standardization could be the culprit, I included. However, I think what is needed more than standardization is a general reporting protocol. Scientists what to know what information to target when they do their studies! We want to know what the modelers need. I intend to at least contribute to answering the questions which remain mysteries, but two brains are better than one and many brains are better than two. The development of a general reporting protocol is not the “sexy” side of science, but it is so relevant. Following procedures that ensure quality control simply cannot be overlooked and after 15 years of research, scientists are still not sure how to even define microplastics. There is still a debate about whether or not microplastics should be less than 5 mm or less than 1 mm. The scientific community is still unsure about whether or not the different colors, shapes, and polymer types should be reported even though there are studies that show that shape and polymer type affect the travel of MPs and the colors can be a factor in the selectivity of organisms that eat the MPs.

In conclusion,

after 15 years of research, questions that should have been clarified at the beginning of experimentation remain unanswered in the world of plastic pollution and likely because the topic seems too complex to standardize, which is a fair argument to make. However, wise words were published by the IPCC in their 2nd Assessment Report, “The challenge is not to find the best policy today for the next 100 years, but to select a prudent strategy and to adjust it over time in the light of new information.” We need to consider which questions we are trying to answer and which problems are most relevant, from there we can develop strategies in standardization. We need to consider what is feasible, too, but feasibility is fluid because as technology improves, so do our scientific achievements. The root of the matter is that we don’t have time to be the first person to think of a new innovative framework specific to one global environmental issue. We should strive at being the first group of world-saving collaborators to implement an existing framework in such a way that it can be adapted to fit the needs of other global environmental problems.