Why is the world's biggest landfill in the ocean?

In the broad expanse of the northern Pacific Ocean, there exists the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre, a slowly moving, clockwise spiral of currents created by a high-pressure system of air currents. The area is an oceanic desert, filled with tiny phytoplankton but few big fish or mammals. Due to its lack of large fish and gentle breezes, fishermen and sailors rarely travel through the gyre. But the area is filled with something besides plankton: trash, millions of pounds of it, most of it plastic. It's the largest landfill in the world, and it floats in the middle of the ocean.

The gyre has actually given birth to two large masses of ever-accumulating trash, known as the Western and Eastern Pacific Garbage Patches, sometimes collectively called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The Eastern Garbage Patch floats between Hawaii and California; scientists estimate its size as two times bigger than Texas [source: LA Times]. The Western Garbage Patch forms east of Japan and west of Hawaii. Each swirling mass of refuse is massive and collects trash from all over the world. The patches are connected by a thin 6,000-mile long current called the Subtropical Convergence Zone. Research flights showed that significant amounts of trash also accumulate in the Convergence

The garbage patches present numerous hazards to marine life, fishing and tourism. But before we discuss those, it's important to look at the role of plastic. Plastic constitutes 90 percent of all trash floating in the world's oceans [source: LA Times]. The United Nations Environment Program estimated in 2006 that every square mile of ocean hosts 46,000 pieces of floating plastic [source: UN Environment Program]. In some areas, the amount of plastic outweighs the amount of plankton by a ratio of six to one. Of the more than 200 billion pounds of plastic the world produces each year, about 10 percent ends up in the ocean [source: Greenpeace]. Seventy percent of that eventually sinks, damaging life on the ocean floor [source: Greenpeace]. The rest floats; much of it ends up in gyres and the massive garbage patches that form there, with some plastic eventually washing up on a distant shore.

Info pulled from: http://science.howstuffworks.com/great-pacific-garbage-patch.htm

Wind Farms

Sweden might be the host for Europe’s largest wind farm if the Swedish government approves the proposed plans. The wind farm will be located in Markbygden near Piteå in northern Sweden and will have a total of 1,101 wind turbines.

“This would be Europe’s, if not the world’s, biggest wind farm,” Caj Noren, a spokesman for the board, told AFP. Construction could begin in two-and-a-half years and would be completed after about a decade, Noren said.

Once constructed the wind farm will produce between 8 to 12 terawatt hours per year and would alone meet Sweden’s national wind power target to reach 10 terawatt hours by 2015. The wind farm is expected to cost about 55 billion Swedish Kronor (around $6.9 billion or €4.5 billion) to construct.

The Swedish right-wing government recently announced that they will reverse a nearly 30-year-old ban on building nuclear power plants. Its madness when we can get cheap, clean renewable energy and at the same time create thousands of new jobs from wind farms like this one.

Simon Leufstedt

Simon Leufstedt is the founder and editor of Green Blog – an environment blog with authors from around the world. He is also the admin of Enviro Space - a place to meet, discuss and interact with other people who share your interests and ideas.