The lowest concentration of oxybenzone that has been shown to damage corals is 62 parts per trillion (ppt). https://lnkd.in/ewSh8V4x
This is equivalent to a drop of water in six and a half Olympic-sized swimming pools. At this concentration, oxybenzone can cause coral bleaching, genetic damage, and death to coral and probably most marine organisms. Every time you use a sunscreen containing Oxybenzone, you are probably killing all marine life is a water volume equivalent to 10,000 cubic meters, or everything in an area 100m x 100m.
The world produces 14,000 tonnes a year of Oxybenzone for sunscreens and other products. If we assume this all enters the world’s oceans, and given that it is lipid soluble, floats on the surface and doesn’t dissolve in the water but becomes concentrated on particles of microplastic and partially combusted carbon, and assuming it is dispersed throughout the top 1m of water depth, 14,000 tonnes give a concentration of 40ppt. We know that the chemical is lethal at 62ppt and is probably toxic down to 10ppt or lower to all zooplankton and phytoplankton.
Plankton are the lungs of the planet and our life support, 50% has been lost since 1970 and the remainder is being destroyed at a rate of 1% to 2% year on year.
The question is…. why are we not stopping the use of this chemical and the other 15,000 lipophilic toxic chemicals that are also being discharged into our ocean?
We could survive climate change; humanity will not survive the destruction of the oceans.
The GOES Report
https://lnkd.in/ev6_2cXN
