Unfortunately, plastic is so durable that the EPA reports “every bit of plastic ever made still exists.” All five of the Earth's major ocean gyres are inundated with plastic pollution. The largest one ...

The Ocean Cleanup is fighting against this accumulation. In 2024, the foundation removed 11.5 million kilos of garbage from the world’s oceans and rivers. They even put a price tag on cleaning up the ...

Plus, once plastic is in the ocean, it accumulates in “giant circular currents” called gyres, which Slat said operate a lot like the drain of the bathtub, meaning that plastic can enter these ...

The plastic swirls in giant gyres in the open oceans, collecting in “garbage patches” (though concentrations are too low to resemble piles of trash). Most of the plastic is degraded into small ...

and other birds of the open ocean roost and forage on sargassum mats. Sargassum enmeshed in rope provides shade and shelter for triggerfish. Human-made debris, from shipping pallets to plastic ...

Photo courtesy of The Ocean Cleanup Project Plus, once plastic is in the ocean, it accumulates in “giant circular currents” called gyres, which Slat said operate a lot like the drain of the bathtub, ...

As these currents swirl, they naturally pull trash toward the centers of the world’s five subtropical gyres – massive, slow-moving whirlpools in the ocean. Over time, these zones turn into plastic ...