Do you have a reference for the main sources of microplastics? My understanding is that they are the result of larger chunks of plastic that just decompose in the oceans. By removing large plastic items we'd make a strong leap forward.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microplastics
It's even in toothpastes!
This is just ridiculous... We need a marketing campaign to shame companies that use these. We ban it or legally enforce labeling of products that use microplastics and create a negative sentiment towards it. Otherwise, this is going to spiral out of control. If we can manage to stop it like ozone depleting CFCs then we'll have a chance to fix this, despite the immense energy cost.
That's assuming most of the macroscopic stuff hasn't already broken down by well before it reaches the gyre.
sometimes they are also directly shipment of small plastic pellets in their production form (ie, before being molded into a toy).