The beaches of Sri Lanka are encrusted with plastic
Greenpeace.org reported (June 4); Another avoidable shipping calamity is plastic pollution in Sri Lanka waters. Government corruption and a plastics addiction are wreaking havoc on the world’s oceans.
After a chemical leak provoked a response in the ship’s cargo, the Singapore-registered X Press Pearl cargo vessel caught on fire while sailing from India to Singapore.
The ship’s load of extremely dangerous materials was spilled into the water when it destroyed. Hundreds of billions of polyethylene and polypropylene pellets, as well as 25 tons of nitric acid and several other chemicals and lubricants, were poured from the ship. Hundreds of tons of plastic pellets, the sort used as raw resources in the manufacturing of different plastic goods, especially single-use plastic packaging, are now washing up on Sri Lanka’s coastlines.
These small particles are wreaking havoc on the water, the shoreline, and the people and animals that live there as if the plastic pollution catastrophe was not bad enough. Greenpeace is working nonstop to uncover companies’ misuse of the environment. Your contribution enables us to study and publicize on their part in the plastic pollution catastrophe, halt the flow of single-use plastics into our seas and communities, and advocate for structural change that safeguards our world.
While military and volunteers are working day and night to pick up the plastic pellet, progress is slow. It’s a close undertaking given the magnitude of the calamity and the limits imposed by the present COVID-19 lockdown.
This is a horrible accident.!!!
Plastic is not only an ocean and garbage issue; it is also an environmental, medical, and social justice issue.
What is the most aggravating aspect? This calamity may have been avoided.
They are (Greenpeace )seeking the following to prevent this from happening again:
- The Plastics Pellets Free Waters Act, presented in May 2021, needs to be passed by the US Congress.
- For containers containing dangerous cargo, all cargo ships should utilize the required locating systems. If transit security cannot be assured, fewer containers per ship must be employed.
- All container ships must be forced to notify authorities when cargo containers are lost or damaged.
- All container ships must be forced to submit data on the cargo in any containers that have been destroyed.
- Plastic should be classed as a hazardous substance and assigned the relevant IMFG codes.
- And last, consumer goods firms must cease supporting the fossil fuel business by employing single-use plastics.
It’s time to stop
This dilemma is another evidence of the consequences of our single-use plastic addiction, as well as the billion-dollar advertising expenditures of corporate polluters that feed it. Perhaps this time will be different; if we speak up loudly enough, we may show the world that we cannot continue in this manner. But we won’t be able to achieve it without your help.
