DeSmog
Mar 9, 2021 @ 11:55
You won’t find an ethane cracker or industrial plastics manufacturing equipment on tiny Sullivan’s Island, South Carolina. The tiny 2.5 mile-long barrier island along the Atlantic coast near Charleston claimed a spot in history for its role in the Revolutionary War, though it’s perhaps better known among vacationers and tourists in recent years for its sandy beachfronts and blue waters.
But, in July 2019, Charleston environmental lawyer Andrew Wunderley arrived on the beach after getting a tip from a dog walker who’d noticed something strange in the sands along Sullivan’s Island. Wunderley arrived to discover an extraordinary number of tiny white bits, so dense and widespread on the beach and in the surf that he later compared them to sleet. The bits were newly manufactured pieces of plastic resin, known as nurdles, which pose hazards to wildlife and contaminate the environment as they breakdown into microplastics.
NationofChange
Small pellets, big problems.
You won’t find an ethane cracker or industrial plastics manufacturing equipment on tiny Sullivan’s Island, South Carolina. The tiny 2.5 mile-long barrier island along the Atlantic coast near Charleston claimed a spot in history for its role in the Revolutionary War, though it’s perhaps better known among vacationers and tourists in recent years for its sandy beachfronts and blue waters.
But, in July 2019, Charleston environmental lawyer Andrew Wunderley
arrived on the beach after getting a tip from a dog walker who’d noticed something strange in the sands along Sullivan’s Island. Wunderley
$1 Million Nurdle Spill Settlement Shines Light on Plastic Pollution During Shipping desmogblog.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from desmogblog.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
settlement after it was accused of releasing plastic packaging pellets into Charleston Harbor.
The settlement is still pending court approval but was filed publicly and settled March 3, according to a new release from the
Southern Environmental Law Center. The settlement specifies that the agreement doesn’t indicate that accusations against Frontier were proven.
The $1 million settlement will be paid in four installments and deposited into an account that will fund water-quality improvements in the Charleston Harbor watershed, the release said. Another $225,000 will go toward paying for attorneys fees and expert costs, the settlement said.
“The ultimate goals of this lawsuit were to stop plastic pellets from polluting Charleston waterways and to compensate for the harm caused by that kind of plastic pollution,” said Catherine Wannamaker, a senior SELC attorney. “We’re pleased to say that has been accomplished.”