On my plastic quest, in order to compare Florida's east coast to west coast plastic content, I visited Pompano Beach and North Miami Beach on October 26, 2013.
Pompano
Beach
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| Tractor cleaning beach |
Observation 1: The beach is lined with high rise buildings
and a wide stretch of sand separates them from the shore. Interestingly enough, I noticed
that the stretch of beach, as well as the high tide line, was littered with small
(less than 1 inch) plastic pieces; then I almost got run over by a tractor-like
vehicle that had a giant metal sieve basket connected to the back.
I think it is great that the city is trying to keep its
beach clean, but I hypothesize this vehicle created the majority of the small
plastic pieces, which could get washed or blown into the ocean.
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| Pompano Beach haul |
Observation 2: This is the first time I collected at a beach
during high tide, and it was fascinating! After the tractor had rolled by I
figured I'd only find small pieces, but pieces ranging from pea to bottle size
were continuously washing up with each wave. The only caveat: sometimes I'd lean down to pick up a piece
with my tweezers, when a wave rolled in and washed it away. I had to travel 485
feet to collect a 2-quart jar full of plastic within in an hour (Melbourne:340ft, Ft. Piece: 133ft), and once I made my way back up the beach the entire
area I had just "cleaned" was re-littered. :(
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| Measuring wrack swath |
North
Miami Beach
Both at North Miami Beach and Pompano Beach, each had about
a 70 inch swath of scattered wrack
-marine vegetation such as seaweed; however, in Pompano Beach only about 25% of
the swath was covered in wrack whereas North Miami Beach had about 65%
coverage. Based on previous observations, I presumed I'd find my 2-quarts of
plastic in a shorter distance, however, I had to travel 687 feet; ergo more
seaweed does not necessarily mean more plastic content as I had hypothesized. I
definitely need to look at how currents and eddies, circular whirlpool-like currents caused by main current
encountering obstacles, hit the Florida coast.
Just a quick note--your NASA contact says that for your PCB analysis he only needs the plastics that you feel certain have been floating around the ocean waters--not left behind by sloppy beach goers. So try to keep the ocean plastics separate from basic beach-goer plastic. And--Paul also suggests that for the larger pieces of plastic, you should take a pic of them in their original form and then cut them into smaller pieces for best analysis...making sure the scissors are not contaminated with PCBs (oh yeah)! They can all be stored in your glass containers. Your NASA contact will extract them using a specific volume of Toluene and then analyzing them with GC-ECD (Gas Chromatographic-Electron Capture Detector).
ReplyDeleteHello Angela: Curious question while reading Dr Woodall's reply. How will the plastics floating around in the ocean differ from those left behind by dirty, sloppy, completely disrespectful beach-goers? Does the ocean water do something to the plastic? Short of turning it into plankton size particles.
DeleteCurrently I am collecting all plastic pieces that I find along the high tide line because maybe the west coast ends up having just as much plastic debris as the east coast due to both coasts having equally lazy visitors. Once I figure out if one coast has more than the other I can further hypothesize as to why and further investigate where what type of plastic might be from. However, at each beach there have been quite a few pieces that have biogenous material on them, such as barnacles, algae, stuff that looks like calcified worm poop - during future sampling expeditions those are the types of pieces I would put in a different jar for PCBs testing.
DeleteGood corrections, Angela!
ReplyDelete