I have always taken for a loss when I read postings that claim plastic garbage patches the size of Texas are floating in some ocean. I am reblogging Kip Hansen’s posting that disputes these claims. He also notes that microbes are consuming much of the plastic. His posting is long but well worth reading.
cbdakota
Guest Essay by Kip Hansen
Images such as this appear on the Internet and in the Main Stream Media, alongside of almost every article or report about the pollution of the Earth’s oceans with plastics of all kinds. The image is usually associated with the words “Great Pacific Garbage Patch” in the text of the article. The implication by association is that the image is a photograph of said ‘garbage patch’.
This clip from the Guardian shows a typical example:
The Guardian is atypical in that it states, in the caption, that the photo is of Manila Bay, Philippines – garbage forced by the wind into a raft near shore after a tropical storm washed all the trash from the city streets and slums into the bay. I’ve seen similar scenes in the Rio Ozama in Santo Domingo, this one at the “yacht marina” on the eastern shore just below…
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Climate Change Sanity 
Chuck: Thanks, very informative. Ed