Ocean Disposal

Oceans cover nearly three-quarters of the Earth. Humans have relied on oceans for thousands of years as a source of food, transportation, mineral and energy resources, and recreation. People have also used the ocean as an unlimited dumping ground for all varieties of refuse. Humanity's collective neglect over centuries is causing a 21st-century crisis.

There is growing awareness that overfishing, pollution, acidification, and cast-off solid waste are impacting human life on a large scale. Various treaties and agreements have been created in the hope that disaster can be averted. Planning, regulation, and oversight of waste disposal in the ocean can help to assuage the problems of the 21st century.

Using the ocean to dispose of society's waste began before the dawn of agricultural civilizations. Human settlements expanded along the shores of rivers, lakes, and seas because they were convenient sources of food, water for drinking and irrigation, and transportation. Dumping wastes in these same waters was also historically an inexpensive way to rid a community of unwanted materials. Animal carcasses, shells and other food waste, trash, and sewage were all removed by flowing water. After industrialization, factory wastes and by-products were also funneled into the nearest water to be carried out of sight.

Coastal cities used the volume and convenience of oceans to dispose of wastes. New York City dumped more than 1 million cartloads of collected wastes into the Atlantic Ocean in 1886 alone, and the city practiced ocean dumping as a primary method of waste disposal for decades. Half a century later, the city was sued by several New Jersey coastal towns to stop polluting the ocean, and the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1934 that dumping of municipal wastes in oceans was illegal. That decision did not end ocean dumping in the United States. As historian Martin Melosi has observed, industrial and commercial wastes were exempt from the decision, and annually more than 50 millions tons of waste were dumped into the ocean in the late 1960s. The U.S. Coast Guard supervised 120 disposal sites in the mid-1970s.