100 million tonnes of plastic are generated each year, and ten percent end up in our oceans. Every square kilometer of this area is home to 46,000 pieces of floating plastic. The world's largest landfill is unfortunately located in the Pacific Ocean. Humans have been carelessly polluting Earth's oceans for countless years with items such as plastic bags, water bottles, foam packaging, fishing nets, ropes, and more. The Pacific Trash Vortex, consisting of two garbage patches, known as the Eastern Pacific Garbage Patch and The Western Pacific Garbage Patch is a place where slowly degrading trash, dead fish, birds and mammals sailors whirl like clockwork. They are held together by a 6,000-mile-long current called the Subtropical Convergence Zone. The appeal of using plastic on land, its strength and long-term durability are what make it so harmful to the ocean and the creatures that inhabit it. The plastic slowly dissolves and becomes part of the water. Some call the Pacific Ocean “the plastic soup.” “Plastic waste floating in the North Pacific has increased 100-fold over the past 40 years. Between 1972 and 1987, no microplastics were found in the majority of samples taken for testing, says the paper published in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters. Today, scientists estimate that the swirling mass of garbage known as the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre (NPSG), or Great Pacific Garbage Patch, is about the size of Texas. Pacific plastic soup. (nd). Accessed March 8, 2014, from http://news.discovery.com/earth/oceans/pacific-ocean-plastic-increase-120509.htm. This is extremely dangerous for organisms living in water. The Pacific trash vortex poses a major threat to the ecosystem and marine life, and people need to be aware of it. of the situation and work to find a solution to the problem. I think this issue is one of the most important, if not the most important, environmental issues facing us today. This garbage has gotten out of control. How could we allow there to be a pile of garbage the size of Texas in our oceans? Since we humans created this problem, it is our duty to solve it. First, we need to find a way to get the trash out of the ocean and dispose of it. Next, promote the use of biodegradable plastic and reduce the danger of plastic to marine life. And finally, make this problem known, let people know about it, and let them know the dangers that come with it. This is one way to solve this problem and start moving towards better, cleaner oceans and a better, cleaner Earth. This concludes my research essay on the Great Pacific Garbage Vortex..