Environmental issues in Hawaii

The majority of environmental issues affecting Hawaii today are related to pressures from increasing human and animal population, as well as urban expansion both directly on the islands and from overseas. These issues include the unsustainable impacts of tourism, urbanization, climate change implications such as sea level rise, pollution (especially marine plastic pollution), and invasive species.

Water quality

The waters surrounding the Hawaiian Islands are affected by increasing waste products like marine debris from land and ocean sources washing onto shore as well as effluents generated and released from the islands themselves. Oceans in particular are being devastated by factors including marine debris, plastic pollution, and tourism.

Marine debris

The positioning of Hawaii in particular makes it a high-impact target for marine debris, given the natural ocean currents and its relative location to the North Pacific Subtropical Convergence Zone. As a result, marine debris is not limited to waste from the islands exclusively but is also carried from other locations around the world. Several organizations, both government and non-government agencies have taken initiatives to counter the environmental impacts of debris carried onto shore through clean-up efforts. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which performs under the United States Department of Commerce, has "led this mission every year since 1996, removing a total of 904 tons of marine debris" as of 2014.

Plastic pollution

Although plastic pollution remains under the umbrella of "marine debris", it is one of the largest concerns affecting marine life and the most ubiquitous source of pollution across the oceans. In a 2014 study, the "first study that compares all sizes of floating plastic in the world's oceans from the largest items to small microplastics," researchers estimated that a minimum of 5.25 trillion plastic particles exist in the ocean.