New Type of Toxic Pollution Called ‘Plastitar’ Found on Canary Islands - EcoWatch

2022-06-14

Excerpt from this story from EcoWatch:

Plastic pollution in the oceans. Microplastics. Oil spills. Each of these items is already a distinct crisis. But researchers in the Canary Islands have coined a term for a new type of pollution they are finding in their studies: plastitar. According to the scientists, plastitar is washing up around shores of islands and consists of tar balls, often found after oil spills, and microplastics.

“No longer is the presence of plastic in the environment limited to microplastics or a bottle in the sea,” Javier Hernández-Borges, associate professor of analytical chemistry at the University of La Laguna in Tenerife, told The Guardian. Hernández-Borges coined the term plastitar. “Now it’s giving rise to new formations; in this case, one that combines two contaminants.”

Scientists first noticed the tar balls coated in plastic fragments two years ago and have now shared this worrisome finding in the journal Science of the Total Environment. The discovery joins other new formations of plastic pollutions taking over the marine environment, including pyroplastics (melted plastic pieces that resemble rocks) and plastiglomerates (the accumulation of melted plastic, basalt lava pieces and coastal sediments).

As for the newly defined plastitar, it consists of tar balls, or pieces of sticky, hardening tar from oil spills, that collects plastic fragments in the water.

“It acts like Play-Doh,” Hernández-Borges explained. “And when waves carrying microplastics or any other kind of marine debris crash on to the rocks, this debris sticks to the tar.”