— By Andru Shively — 

Humanity would do well not to provoke the gods, and Neptune is growing displeased. “No more!” he says unto us, we who pollute his domain with an all too profane creation: microplastics. Now the lord of the sea is spitting our blasphemy back up, one ball of seagrass at a time.

Neptune grass (posidonia oceanica) proliferates in the Mediterranean, forming dense underwater meadows that vitally serve as a haven for biodiversity and as a high-capacity carbon absorber. It is now understood that these grasses are also trapping plastics, which are eventually expelled from the sea via fibrous balls of the plant that commonly wash ashore after storms. Spanish researchers in 2021 estimated that this “natural mechanism” could be filtering around 867 mn pieces of plastic per year.

Still, it shouldn’t be left to nature to clean up mankind’s mess. Any offerings made to the ocean divine ought to be strictly organic. For now, at least, we haven’t drawn the ire of Jupiter, who might next toss back our foul constructs on lightning bolts. Thank the gods indeed…