Do You Know Where Your Trash Ends Up?

What we throw away doesn’t just end up in landfills. A lot of trash ends up being swept up into the ocean, and into massive floating colonies of junk. The largest of these collections, the Plastic Vortex located between Hawaii and mainland United States, is estimated to measure twice the size of Texas and weight over 100 million tons. Animals end up eating the garbage, which is great at soaking up pollutants, transmitting toxins up the food chain that can eventually work their way into humans.

Never heard of this toxic floating dump? Neither have most people. Douglas Woodring, an ocean conservationist based out of Hong Kong, is on a mission to change that. With the help of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, Douglas has just started an expedition, called Project Kaisei, to the Plastic Vortex in order to document and research the formation.

How can you help fight the Plastic Vortex? One of the best ways is to become more eco-friendly by reducing, recycling and reusing. You can also pitch in by following Project Kaisei on Twitter (http://twitter.com/ProjectKaisei) and spreading the word.