Reacción a "Reactions to the dumping of plastic pellets near the Galician coasts"

These pellets represent a very serious environmental problem, as they can remain in the environment for a long time - between 50-70 years - and degrade into smaller particles forming microplastics. The danger to marine organisms is, on the one hand, the physical damage their ingestion can cause, and on the other hand, the damage caused by the associated chemical contaminants. 

These chemical contaminants may be in the pellets, if they contain any additives, or they may be acquired from the environment. There are chemical contaminants that are in very low concentrations in the environment, but they stick to the walls of the pellets and this causes them to concentrate there, making them more dangerous to marine organisms that ingest them.

Studies on pellets collected in the Canary Islands found more than 80 types of associated contaminants, including pesticides, flame retardants and UV filters. 

Moreover, in experiments carried out on fish fed with feed and 10% microplastics and pellets that the EOMAR group collected from beaches and which had chemical pollutants associated with them, it has been found that these chemical pollutants passed into the fish's liver. 

That is why, according to the ECOAQUA institute's research group, in the case of pellet dumping on the coasts of Galicia it is essential to have all the information about these products, what type of plastic it is, if the pellets contain additives and if the technical data sheet contains any kind of specification in this regard. In addition, it is important to remove the pellets quickly from the coast, thus preventing them from getting mixed with sand and algae, which makes it much more difficult to collect them.