This. Keeps. Happening. Another whale has been found dead with plastic trash filling its stomach. This time, a 5.7-meter (about 18-foot) female orca washed up on Plettenberg Bay in South Africa, as News24 reported last week.
Sadly, it appears that the whale had been struggling for some time in the surrounding waters before it was finally found stranded.
"For almost a week, a magnificent Orca has visited our Hope Spot and stayed in the Bay," a Dec. 14 post from the Plett Hope Spot community Facebook page states. "After one successful rescue attempt to return it to the water after beaching last Thursday, by [the National Sea Rescue Institute], today our worst fears were confirmed—this great creature was found dead washed up on Lookout Rocks."
After a necropsy was performed on the killer whale, items such as yogurt cups, the sole of a shoe, food wrappers, seagrass and tubed organisms were found in her stomach, according to Plett Hope Spot Chair and marine mammal researcher Dr. Gwen Penry.
Penry posted several photos of the contents found in the whale's stomach onto her Facebook page. She wrote in the accompanying caption that while the orca's organ and blood samples are still being analyzed to determine the exact cause of death, she suspects that the animal was "starving" because she didn't have actual food in her stomach.
"She had very little real food in her stomach and the stomach lining was disintegrating," she wrote. "We found several large pieces of plastic (yoghurt pots, shoe sole, food wrappers), seagrass and a lot of tubed organisms (yet to be identified). All of this suggests that she was trying to feed in the shallow areas of our bay."
Of course, none of these items are part of an orca's regular diet. "Killer whales off South Africa typically only feed on mammals (seals, dolphins) or large fish and squid," Penry continued. "It is likely that this individual became ill and too weak to hunt with the rest of her pod so moved inshore and tried to feed on what was available and easy to find."
Penry also told News24 about the whale's grisly death that "we're not sure whether it’s cause or effect, but she might have been trying to pick up anything she could. Or she swallowed something earlier on and it blocked her passages, so she felt full, but wasn’t digesting.”
It's clear from a story like this (as well as many, many others) that plastic trash and other marine debris have a major impact on aquatic life. In October, EcoWatch wrote about a mature sperm whale found dead in Taiwan that had vast quantities of plastic bags and fishing nets filling its stomach.
A recent paper published by Environmental Research Letters, A Global Inventory of Small Floating Plastic Debris, suggested there are 15 to 51 trillion microplastic particles in the world’s oceans, weighing somewhere between 93 and 236,000 metric tons.
"This is roughly seven times more than what we thought before," noted EcoWatch insights writer Marcus Eriksen about the comprehensive study.
#Plastic Bags & Fishing Nets Found in Stomach of Dead #Whale https://t.co/kwTtqoiY5C @PlasticPollutes @Seasaver https://t.co/tC0HnsMxpw— EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)1446136537.0
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"Now that we are spending more time at home, we are noticing the large number of delivery vans and lorries driving through cities," said Netherlands environment minister Stientje van Veldhoven, announcing plans to ban all but zero-emission deliveries in 14 cities.
"The agreements we are setting down will ensure that it will be a matter of course that within a few years, supermarket shelves will be stocked, waste will be collected, and packages will arrive on time, yet without any exhaust fumes and CO2 emissions," she added.
She expects 30 cities to announce zero emission urban logistics by this summer. City councils must give four years' notice before imposing bans as part of government plans for emission-free road traffic by 2050. The city bans aim to save 1 megaton of CO2 each year by 2030.
Help to Change
To encourage transport organizations to go carbon-free, the government is offering grants of more than US$5,900 to help businesses buy or lease electric vehicles. There will be additional measures to help small businesses make the change.
The Netherlands claims it is the first country in the world to give its cities the freedom to implement zero-emission zones. Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Utrecht already have "milieuzones" where some types of vehicles are banned.
Tilburg, one of the first wave of cities imposing the Dutch ban, will not allow fossil-fuelled vehicles on streets within its outer ring road and plans to roll out a network of city-wide electric vehicle charging stations before the ban comes into effect in 2025.
"Such initiatives are imperative to improve air quality. The transport of the future must be emission-free, sustainable, and clean," said Tilburg city alderman Oscar Dusschooten.
Europe Takes Action
Research by Renault shows that many other European cities are heading in the same direction as the Netherlands, starting with Low Emission Zones of which Germany's "Umweltzone" were pioneers. More than 100 communes in Italy have introduced "Zonas a traffico limitato."
Madrid's "zona de baja emisión" bans diesel vehicles built before 2006 and petrol vehicles from before 2000 from central areas of the city. Barcelona has similar restrictions and the law will require all towns of more than 50,000 inhabitants to follow suit.
Perhaps the most stringent restrictions apply in London's Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ), which charges trucks and large vehicles up to US$137 a day to enter the central area if they do not comply with Euro 6 emissions standards. From October, the ULEZ is being expanded.
Cities are responsible for around 75% of CO2 emissions from global final energy use, according to the green thinktank REN21 - and much of these come from transport. Globally, transport accounts for 24% of world CO2 emissions.
The Rise of Online Shopping
Part of the reason for traffic in urban areas is the increase in delivery vehicles, as online shopping continues to grow. Retailer ecommerce sales are expected to pass $5billion in 2022, according to eMarketer.
The World Economic Forum's report The Future of the Last-Mile Ecosystem, published in January 2020, estimates that e-commerce will increase the number of delivery vehicles on the roads of the world's 100 largest cities by 36% by 2030.
If all those vehicles burn fossil fuels, the report says emissions will increase by 32%. But switching to all-electric delivery vehicles would cut emissions by 30% from current levels as well as reducing costs by 25%, the report says.
Other solutions explored in the report include introducing goods trams to handle deliveries alongside their passenger-carrying counterparts and increased use of parcel lockers to reduce the number of doorstep deliveries.
Reposted with permission from the World Economic Forum.