Ocean Pollution: Types and Impact To Marine Life

Ocean pollution is one of the major factors for the decline of marine life across the globe. The ocean makes up 70% of the Earth's entire surface, and the ocean water plays an essential role for its inhabitants. And when the ocean water isn’t keeping up with the essentialities, it provides to its tenants, and it spells disaster not only for marine life but for human life as well.

While ocean pollution can be attributed to the overall decline of various marine populations, we have ourselves for this catastrophic event that is taking place every second in every minute. So, if you want to learn more about different types of ocean pollution and how it impacts our marine life, get your pen and paper ready as we will be diving down deeper to address these issues.

Ocean Pollution: Types and Impact to Marine Life

Different types of ocean pollution occur, and they can be layered out into different categories. But one thing holds, and they are all negativities that impact the daily lives of marine creatures on our planet.

Garbage Pollution

One of the biggest threats to marine life is garbage pollution. This garbage can be attributed to various health declines, habitat loss, and certain adaptations that aren’t ideal for one’s species.

Plastic bags like straws, water bottles, and other plastic wastes are the leading problems in garbage pollution, as often, these plastics can be ingested by marine life. In some instances, these plastics can trap or restrict the movement of different creatures like turtles or even whales.

When they are trapped, entangled, and have their movements restricted, it causes insurmountable stress to these creatures, which would eventually cause their untimely demise. There are also types of plastics that harm our ocean creatures, such as polychlorinated biphenyl, which can be found in marine mammal’s tissue up to this day.

Oil Spills

Oil spills are also one of the biggest factors and types of ocean pollution. Whether spills from oil discharge to having an oil tanker get wrecked out in the ocean, this can easily spell disaster to various marine life that lives off that specific location. One of the major reasons is that you can’t easily clean an oil spill. It is a labor-intensive job that requires several people to get it done correctly.

Even if you did it correctly, the damage has already been done, and various species are already affected. In worst-case scenarios, these oil spills destroy coral reefs that are the primary shelter for various species and where predators are looking for food.

Industrial Waste

When it comes to ocean dumping, industrial wastes are also the culprit of ocean pollution. Contaminants that are hazardous to marine life continue to wreak havoc every second. One of the hazardous types of industrial waste is the sewerage system, in which they are constantly being dumped into the open ocean.

Industrial waste can be in various forms, such as city garbage, scrap metals, used oils, industrial solid wastes, scraps, and hazardous chemicals. If the accumulation of these harmful wastes goes into the ocean, the inevitable result of this problem is a rapid decline among various species living in shorelines and coastal regions.

Industrial wastes can be corrosive, toxic, and reactive to a fish’s immune and reproductive system. Once this happens, these species of fishes that have a unique way of reproducing might instill in themselves that it is not the best time to spawn, thus – delaying the multiplication of their kind.

Carbon Dioxide

The burning of fossil fuels can also be attributed to ocean pollution. When there’s an extensive burning of fossil fuels, the carbon dioxide emitted into the air goes bigger by the day. So, as a result, when there’s an increase in carbon dioxide in the air, a substantial amount of carbon dioxide needs to dissolve in the ocean, making the water more acidic than it used to be.

When the ocean is acidic, marine species that specialize in making shells find it harder to make one or even have one. So these creatures are at the bottom of the food chain, and when they are at the bottom of the food chain, these creatures are the primary food source for various marine life, and when they are on the decline, so will the domino effect various food chains as well.

Runoffs

Runoffs can be attributed to various factors, and it can be a congregation of two negative factors, such as the location and source. In a typical fashion, a runoff happens when there’s heavy rain in a certain place, and when water moves downhill, it brings down various pollutants along its way and into the ocean. 

One primary example of this problem is having heavy rain plowing through the city. The rainwater then eventually seeps out various chemicals from sewerage systems, industrial sewers, and oils from the street into the ocean.

Ocean Mining

At the lowest levels of the ocean, ocean mining disrupts and destroys how marine life works. When you talk about mining, it requires people to destroy marine life because of the ability to dig everywhere, searching for gold and other mineral deposits. It is like hitting two birds with one stone if you say you destroy their land, and at the same time, you impact the species as it will be in a hurry looking for a stable place to find food and shelter.

Coral reefs are greatly affected by this as they are constantly being destroyed in the search for that big ‘pay-day for ocean miners. This is becoming a problem as more and more companies are innovating in a way that they can’t be caught up to this day.

Conclusion

Unfortunately, the different types of ocean pollution still ravage every second of every day. Unfortunately, there’s not much we can do as some of these problems aren’t addressed, and if there’s one, it gets debated as more people can be affected by it, and as a result, their income is reduced.

If we value the ocean, we can do so much as an individual. By educating the young ones, we are planting seeds for the future to help our marine life get the best life there is. The ocean is home to millions of fishes that the people also need to survive, and if we make a difference by limiting these factors, I would likely think that this bodes a promising future for both marine and human life.

And by supporting us here at beach Jewelry, you are already part of the meaningful act of helping preserve the Ocean from being destroyed. Part of your purchase is being donated to Ocean conservation charities that we have been supporting as a way of giving back to the Ocean. 

So check out our elegant collection of beach-inspired necklaces now. Together let’s start making a difference for the better future of the Ocean and all other marine life. This way we can still be with them for a longer period of time!