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Ocean Plastics
Image: Creative Commons
Steps, Content & Hints
Main directions and content for the activity are in the boxes to the left with the orange border, like this one.
In a classroom setting, you will lead the students through the activity with a series of questions, the students’ own responses and brief explanations.
Whenever possible, find and affirm what’s right about the students’ answers.
Questions in Context:
Do you remember something better when you are asked to think about it?
On the right, in the conversation bubble outlined in yellow, are guiding questions that you should ask the students during the associated step.
Each question should be asked separately – and a short amount of time should be allowed for responses.
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Green Chemistry Introduction:
Defining Green Chemistry
Have students work in pairs for 30 seconds to come up with a definition for green chemistry. Break down the meaning of both words.
Establish that chemistry is the science of making products.
Eco-friendly, good for the environment, sustainable.
What is Chemistry? What does chemistry mean to you? Do you think of good things or bad things? Who has heard of companies going green? What does that mean?
Green chemistry is pollution prevention at the molecular level, the basic design stage. So what is it that chemists do?
What do chemists do?
Use wait time. Build off of their prior knowledge. Acknowledge student responses and prompt them for more information. Control the conversation by asking for a certain number of answers.
Chemists are inventors. They help to design just about every product out there.
Traditionally chemists were not taught about the environmental impact or toxicology. We have had many advances and helpful inventions but we have also had inventions that have caused harm to the environment. Green chemists design products taking into account the entire process, energy efficiency, renewable resources, the product itself along with the end-of-life impact of the product.
Is there anything in this room that a chemist invented? What about the desks, paint, floor, etc.
Who has taken medicine? Does anyone use an iPod or an mp3 player? What about a computer or a cell phone?
Would you buy a “traditional” cleaner that costs $1 or a “safer” cleaner that costs $5 for the same bottle size?
Would you buy a “traditional cleaner” that cleans well, or a “safer” cleaner that leaves streaks behind?
Green chemists think about safety, cost and performance in their product design
Set the Scene:
Connect the Dots & Introduce the Activity Topic
Connect the dots for them: they are the future scientists who will help to discover and invent solutions to our environmental challenges.
Introduce the 3 criteria of Green Chemistry:
Safety, Cost and Performance.
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Introducing the Problem of Plastics
Reflect back on the discussion about what items in the room were made by chemists. How many of them are made out of plastic?
Let’s talk about why we use plastics.
Inexpensive
Easy to manipulate
Versatile
Many are lightweight
Hopefully some of the students will have brought up points related to disposable plastics. If these types of products haven’t come up yet, guide the group to a discussion about disposable items like cups and water bottles.
Introduce the problem of plastics disposal through asking questions.
About half of the plastics that are produced in a year become waste in less than a year. That includes plastic water bottles, plastic bags, bottle caps – all sorts of different types of plastics. In many areas of the country, like near Boston or San Francisco, it’s easy to think that most of these plastics go into recycling. However, in the United States as a whole, only about 9% of our plastics end up in recycling. That means that 91% of plastic goes to the landfill! That is a whole lot of plastic waste.
But what happens to the plastic after it goes to the landfill? Plastics can take more than 400 years to degrade, so it’s going to stick around for a while.
We just talked about the things in the room that were made by chemists. Which of these items are plastic? How many plastic items can you see around you?
Why do you think so many things are made of plastic? What are some of the benefits of using plastic? What are some things you use on a regular basis that are made of plastic?
How many times during the week do you use a disposable plastic item? What types of disposable plastics do you use? Water/beverage bottles, cups, bags, etc.
What do you do with plastics when you no longer need them? Recycle, landfill. Can anyone give me their best guess for what percentage of plastics actually get recycled?
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Plastics in the Ocean
Because disposable plastic production has increased dramatically in the last few decades, our waste systems have a hard time managing all the plastics that go into the trash. As a result, a lot of plastic waste ends up in the environment. About 8 million metric tons of plastic ends up in the ocean every year. In fact, out of the top ten types of trash found in the ocean, eight are types of plastic!
What types of plastics do you think are commonly found in the ocean? Why?
Plastics ID Challenge
What do types of plastics do we find in the ocean?
Give each group a ziplock containing one of the six types of plastic pieces provided and challenge the groups to identify what the plastic once was. Example, one ziplock will have tiny pieces of plastic water bottles and the students will have to try and determine what those pieces originally belonged to. Give each group a few minutes to discuss and then have them each share what they have decided.
An answer key will be provided in your plastics kit.
When we see plastic in the ocean, it actually looks more like the plastic in your baggies than what it once was. That’s because plastic floating near the top of the water breaks down over time into smaller pieces we call “microplastics”. This is from the impact of sunlight on the plastic pieces – a process called “photodegradation”.
What type of item do you think your plastic pieces once was? Why do you think so?
What do you think ocean plastic looks like?
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Solving the Problem
Discuss ideas the students have for tackling the problem of ocean plastics.
What ideas do you all have about how to solve this big problem? Where should we start?
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle
Ask how many have heard the phrase “reduce, reuse, recycle. Have students share what each one means as you talk about each concept.
Once we get the plastic out of the ocean, we need to find something to do with it.
Pass around the net and filament samples. Adidas, alongside Parley for the Oceans, designed shoes with the help of the Warner Babcock Institute for Green Chemistry that were made from recycled ocean plastic. The net that you see was turned into the filament- basically thread- that was used to make the upper of shoes! That’s one way we can recycle our plastics!
Let’s talk about reusing plastics. Reusing is when you use something again in the same way. Most of us use reusable cups at home rather than using disposable ones.
The best option for dealing with the problem of ocean plastics is to reduce how much plastic we use. If we’re not using plastics, we’re not throwing them away, so they can’t end up in the environment!
What types of things would you want to make with recycled ocean plastic? What items have you seen made with ocean plastic?
What do the items in the baggies look like? What do you think they were used for? Which one was ocean plastic?
What do you think of when you think of “reusing” plastics? How is this different than recycling?
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Other fun Ooho facts:
Made by Skipping Rocks Lab, a London-based startup
The company impact statement is “to stop 1 billion plastic bottles from reaching the ocean every year and to stop 300 million kg of CO2 from ever being emitted”
Producing Ooho packaging takes 9x less energy and produces 5x less carbon dioxide than PET (the packaging for plastic water bottles)
Ooho!
One company out there is working to reduce the number of plastic water bottles produced and consumed by making an alternative water packaging. Their packaging is made from plants and seaweed and can will biodegrade in just 4-6 weeks – the same as a piece of fruit!
Best of all – their packaging is EDIBLE! You can pop the whole pod into your mouth, burst it open, and drink your water!
How Ooho’s packaging is made is a secret but we can make something really similar.
Let’s make our own!
Allow students to make 2-3 pods – you’ll want to make sure you have extra when someone accidentally pops one!
Prepare ahead of time:
Juice and sodium alginate mixture
4.7 g sodium alginate per L juice (0.045 M)
Use either a food safe blender or a hand-mixer to mix
Calcium lactate or calcium chloride bath
11.25 g calcium lactate/chloride per L water (0.034 M)
Stir with food safe spoon or fork
With students:
Each student ladles a 2-3 scoops of alginate/juice into the calcium bath
Allow to sit ~5 min while hydrogel forms
Give each student or student pair a plate for their finished juice pods
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While we’re waiting…
Review green chemistry criteria:
Cost – must be cost comparable or cheaper
Safety – must be safer for human health and/or environment
Performance – must work just as well or better
Review what the group already knows about Ooho pods related to these three criteria. Identify what else you need to know to evaluate this as a green chemistry technology.
We’ll need to test how well it works!
We’ll probably want to test strength, flavor, and if we can use it with more than one type of beverage. What else?
What do we know about Ooho already? What’s the packaging made from? Do you think this is more or less expensive than other kinds of packaging for water? Why or why not?
What things do we need to know if we want to evaluate Ooho? What properties will be important for us to think about when our juice pods finish forming?
Let’s try it!
After ~5 min the juice pods should be fully formed and ready to be eaten. Students should carefully scoop out their pods with their ladles and place them on their plate.
Encourage students to think about the properties they want to evaluate. Have them make some observations and share their thoughts with the group.
Have the students eat their pods. Again, have them share their observations and thoughts with the group. Be prepared for students to get extra excited and unruly at this part!
What does it look like? How does it feel? Does it look appetizing? What else do you notice?
ALLERGY INFORMATION
The polymer contains alginic acid, a common ingredient used as a thickening agent and as a stabilizer.
Does it smell like anything? How does it taste? Does it remind you of anything? Do you like it?
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What next?!
Skipping Rocks Labs, the makers or Ooho, are on a mission to replace plastic water bottles. Discuss with the group what other items they might be able to replace.
What else might we use Ooho pods for? Think about the types of containers you drink out of every day! Juice pouches, juice boxes, plastic water bottles, etc.
Green Chemistry & Ooho
Let’s think back to our green chemistry criteria. How does Ooho stack up?
It’s cheaper than traditional plastic packaging
It’s better for the environment (reduce plastic waste and CO2 emissions)
What about performance?
Discuss how the students might address their concerns about performance.
What did we think of our juice pod’s performance? Would you want to drink like this all the time? Why or why not?
What would we want to change or improve about our juice pods?
Changing our Mindset
Sometimes innovation looks entirely different than the technology we have available now. Think about your cell phones! How many of your parents have talked about how they never would have imagined having a hand-held computer- or even a portable phone- when they were your age? If scientists and engineers never dreamed outside of the box, we wouldn’t have many of the innovations we rely on now.
Pull out the glass and plastic milk jugs. Discuss how disposable plastics is a fairly new idea in the history of mankind. Until the last 60 years or so, people relied on reusing materials. Use milk jugs as an example of how our economy has changed.
How many of you have ever used a glass milk jug? What might be the benefits of using a glass container vs the plastic? How might it change the way we get milk? Why might you want to use one or the other?
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Changing our Mindset [continued]
To solve problems related to ocean plastics, we might need to change our entire mindset around plastics. Maybe we’ll need to reimagine water bottles! Maybe we’ll have to re-think our disposable plastics economy!
In closing:
Green chemistry provides the tools needed for creating solutions to environmental challenges.
As a green chemist you can be a part of the solution by inventing better technologies for the future. Also remember that you do not need to be a scientist to make a difference in this world. As an informed citizen you have the power to influence change with your decision making, voting power and purchasing choices.
Any questions?
Wrapping up is always a good time to talk a little more about why you are in the classroom, what you are studying, researching or pursuing as a career.
For more information:
A Whopping 91% of Plastic Isn’t Recycled:
Skipping Rocks Lab:
What Is Marine Litter?:
What Causes Marine Litter?:
The Problem with Plastics:
Adidas|Parley:
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