Rainer Lohmann, associate professor at the Graduate School of Oceanography, and a Canadian colleague say a global monitoring network is needed to verify that banned chemicals, such as PCBs and others that can accumulate in the food web, are actually disappearing from the environment.
Lohmann says the United Nations Stockholm Convention, which analyzes chemical compounds and has banned the production and use of some, is vital, “but it is very difficult to verify whether or not it is working.’’
Atmospheric testing is done in some parts of the world, but Lohmann says aquatic monitoring is critical, because people and wildlife can ingest banned chemicals by eating fish, shellfish, and other marine organisms.
Inexpensive plastic painters’ drop cloths can help, he said. The thin polyethylene material absorbs dissolved chemical compounds, and a lab can then identify and measure levels of those chemicals. Sections of the sheets, usually a foot long by a half-foot wide, are anchored in the water for several weeks.
Lohmann did not invent the polyethylene samplers, but he helped test them in Boston Harbor in 2007 and subsequently won a $300,000 National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration grant to study them further.
What’s more, he says, they are so easy to use that volunteers could help test the waters, decreasing the costs.
Yes, they will be made from a fabric - but it’s spun from molten plastic pellets. Babson officials say each gown takes an average of 23 bottles to make, which means the graduates will be wearing the equivalent of 20,700 bottles.
The school is also printing its diplomas on locally produced cotton parchment.
Article By Beth Daley
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