That is especially true for mosquito pesticides. Would not it be ironic if all this time it was pesticides in the Keys that were killing the corals? No one is going to do that research. For the most part, we just pick around the edges of problems, so knee-jerk finger pointing will likely continue until the coral bounces back and everyone can claim victory. I admit this is a personal, rather cynical history not to be found in Chamber of Commerce publications or publications from various agencies. You certainly won’t

see a connection made between see more square groupers and coral demise anywhere! “
“Plastics are synthetic organic polymers, which are derived from the polymerisation of monomers extracted from oil or gas (Derraik, 2002, Rios et al., 2007 and Thompson et al., 2009b). Since the development of the first modern plastic; ‘Bakelite’, in 1907, a number of inexpensive manufacturing techniques have been optimised, resulting in the mass production of a plethora of lightweight, durable, inert and corrosion-resistant plastics (PlasticsEurope, 2010). These attributes have led to the extensive use of plastics in near inexhaustible applications (Andrady, 2011). Since mass production began in the 1940s, the amount of plastic being manufactured has increased rapidly, with 230 million tonnes of plastic being produced globally in 2009 (PlasticsEurope, 2010), accounting

for ∼8% of global oil production (Thompson et al., 2009b). Whilst the societal benefits of plastic

are far-reaching (Andrady and Neal, 2009), this valuable commodity has been the subject of increasing environmental click here concern. Primarily, the durability of plastic that makes it such an attractive material to use also makes it highly resistant to degradation, thus disposing of plastic waste is problematic (Barnes et al., 2009 and Sivan, 2011). Exacerbated by the copious use of throw-away “user” plastics (e.g. packaging material), the proportion of plastic contributing to municipal waste constitutes 10% of waste generated worldwide (Barnes et al., 2009). While some plastic waste is recycled, the majority ends up in landfill where it may take centuries for such material to breakdown and decompose (Barnes et al., 2009 and Moore, 2008). Decitabine in vivo Of particular concern are plastics that, through indiscriminate disposal, are entering the marine environment (Gregory, 2009). Despite plastics being an internationally recognised pollutant with legislation in place aimed to curb the amount of plastic debris entering the marine environment (Gregory, 2009 and Lozano and Mouat, 2009), Thompson (2006) estimates up to 10% of plastics produced end up in the oceans, where they may persist and accumulate. The impact that large plastic debris, known as ‘macroplastics’, can have on the marine environment has long been the subject of environmental research.