TL;DR: Auckland’s beaches have 50 times more microplastics pollution than previously thought, a new study shows, partly because of all the synthetic rubber shed by its increasingly heavy cars, SUVs and double-cab utes — even the new electric ones — and sluiced into the sea by stormwater systems.
Microfibres from synthetic materials used in increasingly popular athleisure and ‘fast-fashion’ clothing are an even bigger contributor.
Meanwhile, Transport Minister Simeon Brown quietly ordered transport funders to prioritise more cars and roads, rather than cycling and walking. The National-ACT-NZ First coalition also cancelled a project that would have allowed more freight and passengers off the roads of our national transport spine and onto rail. Both moves fly in the face of the Climate Commission’s advice this week on emissions reduction.
It is no use solving for climate change if it worsens problems with biodiversity
Elsewhere in the news in the last fortnight:
Electric vehicles (EVs) contribute 20% more tyre emissions than cars run on internal combustion engines (ICEs) and particle pollution from tyres could be up to 2000 times worse than car tailpipe emissions;
Microplastics, like pesticides, contain endocrine disrupters, and these are causing rising infertility rates in both humans and wildlife; and,
The Public Health Communication Centre of Aotearoa (PHCC) listed 10 ways in which the policy bonfire of environmental protection threatens public health.
This is Cathrine Dyer’s wrap of climate and environment news for all free and paying subscribers to The Kākā. It is made possible by subscribers signing up to the paid tier to ensure this sort of public interest journalism is available fully in public to read, listen to and share.
Auckland’s massively micro beach pollution
Microplastics pollution at popular Auckland beaches from Herne Bay to St Helier’s Bay has been found at levels that are 50 times higher than previously detected elsewhere in Aotearoa, startling the scientists involved, according to Jamie Morton at NZ Herald this week.
The study, undertaken by a team from the University of Auckland, used sophisticated imaging technology (laser direct infrared imaging or LDIR) that is able to identify smaller sizes of microplastics. Microplastics, which derive from fossil carbon, leach toxic chemicals into rivers and oceans, devastating wildlife and accumulating in the food chain. Smaller microplastics can even pass through membranes and cause sub-cellular level issues.
The study’s findings suggest that microplastic pollution in the marine environment has been significantly underestimated because the technology used in studies hasn’t captured smaller particle sizes. The authors point out that there is further scope to measure even smaller particle sizes in the future (sizes ranging from 5 to 20 μM) than what is captured by LDIR.
The bulk of the plastic contamination they found is not from packaging, but is in the form of fibres from polyester clothing. These were highest at beaches where more people swim. The study also found a high concentration of microplastics related to cars, specifically synthetic rubber from tyres transported by stormwater drainage systems.
Environmental issues have a nasty habit of hooking up and producing offspring. A report from Pew Charitable Trust found as much as 78% of all ocean microplastic pollution is related to tyre dust. This source of pollution from cars is now much higher than that detected from tailpipe emissions (possibly as much as 2000 times worse) but has so far escaped regulation because it is harder to measure and control. According to a report from Yale Environment 360, electric vehicles are amplifying the issue because their tyre emissions are 20% higher than fossil fuelled vehicles. This is because electric vehicles weigh more and have far greater torque, which wears tyres out faster. Their report goes on to note that,
“Tire wear particles, or TWP as they are sometimes known, are emitted continually as vehicles travel. They range in size from visible pieces of rubber or plastic to microparticles, and they comprise one of the products’ most significant environmental impacts, according to the British firm Emissions Analytics, which has spent three years studying tire emissions. The company found that a car’s four tires collectively emit 1 trillion ultrafine particles — of less than 100 nanometers — per kilometer driven. These particles, a growing number of experts say, pose a unique health risk: They are so small they can pass through lung tissue into the bloodstream and cross the blood-brain barrier or be breathed in and travel directly to the brain, causing a range of problems.
According to a recent report issued by researchers at Imperial College London, “There is emerging evidence that tyre wear particles and other particulate matter may contribute to a range of negative health impacts including heart, lung, developmental, reproductive, and cancer outcomes.”
A real life Children of Men situation?
A 2022 update of a meta-review study that led to co-author Shanna Swan’s book Countdown: How Our Modern World Is Altering Male and Female Reproductive Development, Threatening Sperm Counts, and Imperiling the Future of the Human Race, found that reproductive development for men and women is deteriorating at a rate of 1% per year, and that sperm counts have been declining at more than twice that rate since 2000. The decline is attributed to endocrine-disrupting chemicals found in pesticides and plastics. They found declines in sperm count of over 60% between 1973 and 2018. Whereas earlier studies were focused on developed countries, the updated study found that fertility rate declines are, in fact, global and accelerating in the 21st century. The World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates that 17.5% of the adult population (or one in six) currently experience infertility.
Because the male reproductive system, like a Victorian-era bridge, is massively overbuilt, halving sperm counts has had little impact on overall fecundity rates (or offspring per parent) so far. However, there is evidence to suggest this might be changing. The adverse effects of micro and nano plastics on reproductive health is a growing area of study as potentially critical thresholds in human fertility rates are approached.
It’s a reminder that dealing with environmental issues requires a systems-level view, rather than issue-specific responses (with their frequently reductive techno-solutions). It is no use solving for climate change if it worsens problems with biodiversity or ‘novel entities’ (a term for environmental pollutants that includes microplastics in the Planetary Boundaries Framework), to the degree that it contributes to a different existential threat to humanity and other species. It is also a peek into the many ways that fossil fuels underlie what Vaclav Smil refers to as “the four material pillars of modern civilisation”: concrete, steel, plastics, and ammonia. (Taimur Ahmad provides a great explainer of “our chronic oil dependency” here).
Will Elon Musk’s Cybertruck cause mass emasculation?
It’s possible that a transition to EV’s may do more to address climate change as a result of the unanticipated population impact of tyre emissions, than from the beneficial effects of reducing exhaust emissions. This would be deeply ironic given Elon Musk’s pre-occupation with fertility collapse. If a (however unlikely) ‘Children of Men’ style apocalypse isn’t the change you were seeking, there are ways to avoid that without having to colonise Mars.
Mode shifting from cars, SUVs and double-cab utes to walking, cycling, buses and trains make more climate, environment and health sense than replacing every current vehicle with a heavy electric equivalent driving on fossil-fueled tarseal. A new EV is better than a new petrol or diesel one, but any cycling, walking or public transport journey is better.
In other news in over the last fortnight…
Four tyres good: two tyres bad?
Simeon Brown has quietly instructed officials to stop developing policy alternatives to private car transport. In a letter seen by Newsroom, the transport minister instructed officials at Waka Kotahi-NZTA to end work on programs that provide alternatives such as active or public transport. Brown wrote,
“I understand that some local authorities have been developing programmes with NZTA and other stakeholders to reduce vehicle kilometres travelled (VKT) by the light vehicle fleet, using funding from the Climate Emergency Response Fund,”.
“I have given notice to NZTA to end its work on these programmes, and to not commit any further funding to local authorities (beyond existing contractual obligations) to develop these programmes.”
In addition to slamming the brakes on cycling and walking projects, as Newshub puts it, the government this week made a shock decision to decline further investment in KiwiRail’s Cook Strait ferry project that would have safe-guarded rail and road connections between the North and South Islands. It is possible that a cheaper option could prioritise road over rail transport, resulting in infrastructure lock-in that limits future freight and passenger choices. This all came just as the Climate Change Commission finally came around to the idea of recommending development of the rail network in Aotearoa. A recent report from PHCC on the public health effects of the environmental policy bonfire is also worth a read.
Our freedom to choose how to get around is severely constrained by government policy decisions favouring cars and roads. As Orwell might say: ‘four tyres good, two tyres bad.’
A plan to make half of America a carbon sink
Meanwhile, a plan to store captured carbon dioxide under U.S. national forests is causing alarm according to this story in Grist. Critics are concerned that leaks from pipelines and wells could injure or kill people and animals, as well as damaging the forest.
“In 2020, a carbon dioxide pipeline ruptured in Mississippi, sending 49 people to the hospital.”
“Concentrations of the gas, which is odorless and heavier than oxygen, can also prevent combustion engines from operating. Bodan Tejeda, of the Center for Biological Diversity, worries that people even a mile or two from a carbon dioxide leak could start suffocating and have no way to escape.”
They are also concerned about the impact of installing and maintaining the facilities in national forests. It turns out, however, that national forests are just the tip of the iceberg, with more than half of the country’s landmass being eyed up for carbon dioxide storage.
The Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has just released a new report titled “Roads to Removal: Options for Carbon Dioxide Removal in the United States,” that outlines how the country could achieve Net-Zero emissions by 2050 by storing gigatonnes of CO2.
“The CO2 captured via BiCRS or DACS1 will need to be durably stored below ground. Roads to Removal suggests that more than half of the land area in the nation has the potential for safe CO2 geological storage.”
Book recommendations
Yale Climate Connections recommends 12 climate change books to give to family and friends over the festive season, including New Zealand author Eleanor Catton’s book Birnam Wood. The book features a guerrilla gardening group versus an American billionaire and his end-times bunker. According to the New York Times review “The whole thing crackles, like hair drawn through a pocket comb.”
A good COP, a bad COP
The words ‘phase out’ were deleted from the final statement at COP28, but UN Climate Change Executive Secretary Simon Stiell still called it the “beginning of the end of the fossil fuel era”, even while admitting “we didn’t turn the page”
Mass coral bleaching?
Experts are predicting a mass coral bleaching event in 2024 according to a new paper in Science. Lead author Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, speaking to The Guardian said
“If it’s going to be ‘summers from hell’ type thing, many of us are fearing that this may be a tipping point that we’ve passed, meaning that we can’t come back. We don’t know the implications of such a spike in temperature.”
Mass bleaching and mortality of coral events in the Indo-Pacific, which will lead to long-term damage to ecosystems and the millions of people in the Earth’s tropical regions who depend on them, could worsen unless greenhouse gas emissions decrease, he said.”
A carbon futures tool
Carbon Brief featured a fascinating new interactive tool that provides access to the thousands of possible climate futures that were explored by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 2022. These include pathways that limit warming to 1.5 and 2˚C, both with and without temporarily overshooting those targets.
“These different modelled pathways provide insights into possible future greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and temperature trajectories, depending on the many choices that global society makes.”
Climate finance from Aotearoa
Māori start-up, Hinemoana Halo Ocean Fund secured US$50 million in funding over at COP28 in a “potentially game-changing initiative for Aotearoa, according to Laura Gemmell for the Spinoff.
“The purchase of Hinemoana Halo credits will go towards the restoration of seagrass meadows, wetlands, mangroves and coastal forests; all critical for preventing erosion, providing habitats for marine life and sequestering carbon dioxide. There’s also a recovery plan for taonga species such as whales, dolphins and manta rays.
“Biodiversity thrives in the hands of indigenous peoples. We have a deep connection with nature and generations of knowledge. It’s in the fabric of our identity,” explains Aperahama Edwards. “We view the natural world as our ancestors. Biodiversity is our sibling. This project will enable indigenous communities to fulfil their responsibilities as kaitiaki, guardians of nature.””
The fund, which has potential to scale globally, is designed to create a fair transition for indigenous communities, while also providing finance for ongoing care and protection of coastal and marine areas.
Catch you all next year
Cathrine
BiCRS refers to Biomass Carbon Removal and Storage, referred to as ‘bikers’, while DACS refers to Direct Air Capture Systems
Auckland's double-cab utes and yoga pants drive massive ocean micro-pollution