It seems like microplastics are everywhere these days — but their impacts on human health remain unclear. Today we take a closer look at why that is and how scientists are trying to get a clearer picture.

Megan Hall: Welcome to Possibly, where we take on huge problems like the future of our planet and break them down into small questions with unexpected answers. I’m Megan Hall.

It feels like there’s a new story every day about microplastics — in our blood, in our organs, even in our brains. But what does this all mean? Are microplastics bad for us? How bad? And how do we know?

Here to tell us more are reporters Will Malloy and Nat Hardy from our Possibly team

Will Malloy: Hey Megan!

Nat Hardy: Hello!

Megan Hall: To start, can you remind me what microplastics are?

Will Malloy: There are a couple of different definitions. Here’s a simple one: any plastic particles smaller than five millimeters. 

Megan Hall: And how big is that?

Nat Hardy: Yeah. 5 millimeters is pretty big, about the size of a grain of rice. But these microplastics can also be tiny. So small that you can’t see them.

Megan Hall: Where do they come from?

Will Malloy:  All sorts of places —  a lot of cosmetic products contain microplastics, synthetic fabrics like fleece shed microplastics when you wash and wear them, car tires shed microplastics on the road. The list goes on.

Nat Hardy: And as you said, Megan, they’re everywhere.

Susanne Brander: Over the past about five to eight years or so, there have been a lot of studies in humans and we found them wherever we’ve looked.

Will Malloy: That’s Dr. Susanne Brander — she’s a professor at Oregon State University who studies how microplastics affect aquatic ecosystems.

Nat Hardy: Susanne says, even though we know microplastics are in us, we don’t necessarily know what that means for our health… yet.

Susanne Brander: A lot of what we know about humans is that they exist in our bodies. We just don’t have a full picture of what they might be doing.

Megan Hall: Why not?

Will Malloy: At the end of the day, scientists haven’t been looking at what microplastics do inside the body for very long at all.

Nat Hardy: Research on small plastics started in the 70s and 80s, but at first, scientists were just focused on studying them in the ocean and in marine animals, like fish. 

Will Malloy: Scientists didn’t start looking for evidence that microplastics are in people’s bodies until about a decade ago.

Nat Hardy: In these early stages, research has been really focused on establishing that microplastics are there at all — we are only starting to study what they do to us.

Megan Hall: So does that mean we have no idea what they’re doing to us?

Nat Hardy: Not necessarily —

Susanne Brander: We have a lot of data from other animals, rodents, fish, other vertebrates, invertebrates.

Will Malloy: We call these “model species” — if we can understand how microplastics affect them, we might get some insight into how they affect us. 

Nat Hardy: Scientists use model species all the time.

Susanne Brander: To understand the impacts of any kind of chemical on the human system, we often use model species to sort of mimic or better understand how that chemical is going to behave if we’re exposed to it.

Megan Hall: So, what are these studies in model species telling us?

Will Malloy: A review of studies done in rodents found a lot of health impacts associated with microplastics.

Nat Hardy: Things, like changes to their reproductive, digestive, and neurological systems.

Will Malloy: So those could be important things to pay attention to in humans.

Megan Hall: I get that we don’t know a lot yet, but when are we going to know if this is something to worry about?

Nat Hardy: That’s a really great question because it has a lot to do with how science works fundamentally.

Susanne Brander: It’s not as if one paper right is going to change the field, it’s that different scientists who are doing similar work, that that work begins to produce similar results, and that those results are in agreement with one another.

Will Malloy: As more and more people look into this, we will hopefully start to see patterns and consensus will arise as many scientists work really hard to find answers.

Nat Hardy: There’s still so much we don’t know, but Susanne says…

Susanne Brander: I do think, and others have said similarly, that we know enough to act.

Will Malloy: Reducing our exposure to microplastics probably won’t hurt us in any way, even though we don’t yet know if or how much it will help.

Megan Hall: So, how do I reduce my exposure to microplastics??

Nat Hardy: That’s a bigger topic for another episode, but the short answer is: cutting back on plastics in any way you can will help.

Will Malloy: Things that come in contact with your food are a good place to start.

Megan Hall: Got it. Thanks, Will and Nat!

That’s it for today. You can find more information, or ask a question about the way your choices affect our planet, at askpossibly.org. You can also subscribe to Possibly wherever you get your podcasts or follow us on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Bluesky at  “askpossibly”

Possibly is a co-production of Brown University’s Institute for Environment and Society, Brown’s Climate Solutions Initiative, and Ocean State Media.

The post How do we know if microplastics affect our health? appeared first on TPR: The Public’s Radio.

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Microplastics are all around us, even if we can’t see them. This week, the Possibly team investigates where they come from and why sometimes, they’re even made on purpose.

Megan Hall: Welcome to Possibly, where we take on huge problems like the future of our planet and break them down into small questions with unexpected answers. I’m Megan Hall.

We’ve talked about microplastics on the show before — but where are these little pieces of plastic coming from? We had Will Malloy and Nat Hardy from our Possibly team find out more.

Will Malloy: Hi Megan!

Nat Hardy: Hello!

Megan Hall: So, just to start, what exactly are microplastics?

Will Malloy: Just what they sound like — tiny pieces of plastic, ranging from smaller than a red blood cell to about the size of a grain of rice.

Nat Hardy: And they have ended up pretty much everywhere on Earth.

Sherri Mason: It doesn’t matter where we’ve looked, we find microplastics. So from the top of Mount Everest to the bottom of the Mariana Trench.

Will Malloy: That was Dr. Sherri Mason — she’s a professor at Gannon University, where she studies plastic pollution.

Nat Hardy: She told us that microplastics are created in two different ways.

Will Malloy: The first kind are microplastics that are intentionally manufactured.

Megan Hall: People make them on purpose?

Nat Hardy: Remember, microplastics can be as big as a few millimeters– so that includes things like glitter or small beads.

Will Malloy: Also, most larger plastic products are made out of tiny plastic pellets called “nurdles.” 

Sherri Mason: This is actually the starting point of plastics. These little plastic pellets, that is what is shipped from a refinery where plastics are initially produced to a company that makes plastic products.

Nat Hardy: In order to make something like a water bottle, manufacturers start with these pre-made nurdles.

Will Malloy: And all throughout the process, as they are moved around…

Sherri Mason: You will have hundreds, if not 1000s, of nurdles that get released. And I know this because I see it.

Nat Hardy: It can get really bad when there’s an accident.

Will Malloy: In 2021, a cargo ship caught fire off the coast of Sri Lanka, and spilled billions of nurdles into the ocean. They are really hard to clean up and the ocean currents can carry them far.

Megan Hall: So that’s one way microplastics are created — when we make them. But you said there’s another way, right?

Nat Hardy: Yeah, and these are probably what you think of when you think about microplastics — little pieces that are formed unintentionally when larger plastic products break into smaller pieces. 

Will Malloy: This kind is way more common and they truly come from everywhere — washing synthetic fabrics sheds fibres, driving causes tires to erode and leave behind particles, and fishing nets in the ocean leave a trail of plastic in the water.

Sherri Mason: Any piece of plastic as it has these physical processes that act on it will be releasing microplastics. So just the simple act of twisting off a cap from a plastic bottle of water can shed microplastics into the beverage that you’re about to drink.

Nat Hardy: That means they get into the water, the air, our food, and our bodies.

Megan Hall: So, do microplastics ever go away?

Will Malloy: That’s the thing — not really. On the smallest level, plastics are made up of long chains of molecules held together with chemical bonds.

Nat Hardy: These kinds of chains and bonds don’t really exist in nature, so microorganisms aren’t very good at decomposing them.

Will Malloy: There are some microbes that can do it, but they aren’t very common. Mostly, plastics just get smaller and smaller, but they still stick around.

Sherri Mason: It is not uncommon to hear plastic pollution researchers say that, you know, most plastic that has ever been created is still on this planet somewhere.

Will Malloy: Once they get into our ecosystems, it’s really hard to get them out.

Megan Hall: Is there any way to stop them from polluting our world?

Nat Hardy: There’s no easy fix. The only real way to stop microplastics is to phase out plastic.

Sherri Mason: You know, we had society before plastic. We can have society without plastic, and we can certainly have society with a lot less plastic.

Will Malloy: At the same time, though, plastic is light and strong, which makes it very useful. So eliminating plastic also comes with tradeoffs. That’s a conversation for another episode.

Megan Hall: Got it. Thanks Will and Nat!

That’s it for today. You can find more information, or ask a question about the way your choices affect our planet, at askpossibly.org. You can also subscribe to Possibly wherever you get your podcasts or follow us on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Bluesky at  “askpossibly”

Possibly is a co-production of Brown University’s Institute for Environment and Society, Brown’s Climate Solutions Initiative, and Ocean State Media

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Turkeys are more than just a Thanksgiving meal, they’re a part of forest ecosystems across the country. In this episode of Possibly, we take a look at how they made a major comeback in New England after being driven to local extinction.

This episode of Possibly originally aired on November 26th, 2024

Megan Hall: Welcome to Possibly, where we take on huge problems like the future of our planet and break them down into small questions with unexpected answers. I’m Megan Hall.

Where I live in Rhode Island, turkeys are more than just a Thanksgiving treat, they’re a neighbor. I feel like I see them everywhere – including wandering the streets near my house. But they haven’t always been doing so well. In fact, wild turkeys were locally extinct for many decades.

Possibly reporters Will Malloy and Nat Hardy took a look into how they made their comeback.

Will Malloy: Hi Megan!

Nat Hardy: Hi!

Megan Hall: So turkeys – where did they go and how did they come back?

Will Malloy: Like you, Megan, I was surprised to learn that there were no turkeys in Rhode Island as recently as the 1980s – my friends and I even saw a bunch running around in the road the other day.

Nat Hardy: Lizzi Bonczek, Upland Game Bird Biologist for the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management, says that turkeys are a natural part of our environment.

Lizzi Bonczek: Before colonial settlement, there was just vast amounts of of woods.

Will Malloy: Indigenous people used practices like controlled burns to keep the forests in a mix of different stages. Most areas had thick woods with parts cleared for farming.

Nat Hardy: This kind of mix gave turkeys different places to search for food, nest, and raise their chicks.

Will Malloy: But when European settlers arrived, they clear-cut about two-thirds of the state’s forests for farming. 

Nat Hardy: Which was bad news for the turkeys.

Will Malloy: Plus, early settlers hunted them for food and over time, turkey populations shrunk.  By the early 1900s, there were no turkeys left in Rhode Island.

Nat Hardy: And the same thing happened all over New England.

Lizzi Bonczek: Vermont, Maine, Connecticut. Crazy to think about. No turkeys on the landscape.

Megan: That’s unbelievable! How did they come back?

Will Malloy: Lots of people abandoned their farms, which gradually turned back into forests. Rhode Island also introduced hunting rules that protected wildlife.

Nat Hardy: In the 1960s, many New England states began to reintroduce turkeys, hoping that those forests were strong enough to support them again.

Will Malloy: And in 1980, the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management and the National Wild Turkey Federation teamed up to release 29 turkeys in Exeter, Rhode Island.

Megan Hall: Wait, where did they get those turkeys?

Nat Hardy: From Vermont actually! A decade earlier, the state had relocated a flock of turkeys from New York. And by 1980 even Vermont had turkeys to spare!

Megan Hall: So they literally caught a flock of turkeys there and brought them into Rhode Island?

Will Malloy: Yes!

Nat Hardy: Trapping turkeys is a dramatic process involving something called a cannon net.

Lizzi Bonczek: So we still use this device today to trap all sorts of animals. And it’s a big net that is secured at the base, and you use explosives to send the net out over the individuals. So it’s pretty fun.

Will Malloy: But don’t worry, the turkeys are fine! This technique allows biologists to safely capture wild game and move them to a new place.

Megan Hall: How did the turkeys do?

Will Malloy: Pretty well, actually.

Nat Hardy: The state kept the program going and released flocks around the state over the next 10 years.

Will Malloy: And since then the population has continued to grow. But scientists are still keeping a close eye on the turkeys, to make sure they’re doing ok.

Megan Hall: So this is a success story?

Nat Hardy: For sure.

Will Malloy: First of all, it’s a great example of how states can work together to solve environmental and ecological problems.

Lizzi Bonczek: The reintroduction, really was this whole regional collaboration between, the states that have turkeys, the states that don’t have turkeys, the federal agencies that oversee these laws

Nat Hardy: Plus, Lizzi says, there’s just something that feels good about living in a place where you get to see all sorts of animals, in your own neighborhood!

Lizzi Bonczek: And so I was driving along, and I noticed in the woodline there was a flock of turkeys. They were all kind of in the shade, and I just, like, sat there for a while with my binoculars and just watched them be turkeys. And, you know, one was sitting on a log, preening another one. They’re kind of, you know, poking around, probably looking for seeds or bugs. There’s that, right, intrinsic value of just enjoying watching wildlife be wild.

Will Malloy: So, when I’m eating turkey this Thanksgiving, I’ll be feeling a little extra grateful for these guys.

Megan Hall: Same here. Thanks Will and Nat!

That’s it for today. You can find more information, or ask a question about the way your choices affect our planet, at askpossibly.org. You can also subscribe to Possibly wherever you get your podcasts or follow us on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Bluesky at  “askpossibly”

Possibly is a co-production of Brown University’s Institute for Environment and Society, Brown’s Climate Solutions Initiative, and Ocean State Media.

The post Wild turkeys were locally extinct for decades. How did they come back? appeared first on TPR: The Public’s Radio.

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Gas stoves can pollute the air in our homes and even contribute to climate change. But lots of people enjoy cooking on them. Is there a way to switch away from gas that works well and doesn’t break the bank?

Megan Hall: Welcome to Possibly, where we take on huge problems like the future of our planet and break them down into small questions with unexpected answers. I’m Megan Hall.

When it’s dinner time in my house, I fire up the gas stove, just like 38% of Americans. I know that more and more studies are showing that burning that gas inside our homes can hurt our health and the environment – but what can we do about it?

Here to tell us more are Will Malloy and Nat Hardy.

Will Malloy: Hi Megan!

Nat Hardy: Hello!

Megan Hall: So, why are we talking about getting rid of gas stoves?

Will Malloy: There are basically two reasons – the air quality inside our homes, and the impact on the environment.

Nat Hardy: The environmental stuff is pretty straightforward – gas stoves burn, well, natural gas, mostly methane – a powerful greenhouse gas.

Will Malloy: Burning that natural gas is less of the problem here actually – most of the emissions from gas stoves come from when that methane leaks into the atmosphere without being burned.

Nat Hardy: One study found that, between all the households in the US, stoves leak 500,000 cars’ worth of methane into the atmosphere every year.

Megan Hall: Is that a lot?

Will Malloy: It’s not nothing – but there are over 275 million motor vehicles on the road in the US, so cooking with gas isn’t as big of a deal as other things we do – like driving.

Nat Hardy: But if we want to get rid of fossil fuels, we have to wean ourselves off of natural gas completely.

Will Malloy: There’s another reason you might want to switch sooner rather than later, though – your health.

Stephen Porder:  We’re starting to see that indoor air quality is really strongly affected by burning gas in your house, which, if you think about it, is actually not all that surprising.

Nat Hardy: That’s Stephen Porder, our show’s founder and Brown University’s provost for Sustainability.

Will Malloy: And like he said, burning gas inside puts pollutants into the air, like nitric oxides and benzene.

Nat Hardy: These pollutants can hurt us – there’s strong evidence that cooking with gas stoves indoors is associated with children developing asthma.

Will Malloy: There’s also evidence that households that replace their gas stove with an electric one see benefits to their health.

Nat Hardy: A study in Ecuador looked at what happened when the government encouraged people to switch away from gas stoves –

Stephen Porder: What they found is that across Ecuador, for every 1% of people, extra people, who enrolled in the program and switched off of their gas stove, they had a 1% drop in all-cause hospitalization, and a one or 2% drop in the things you typically would associate with bad air quality, like lung problems and heart attacks. So that’s a really direct human health impact.

Megan Hall: Wow! That seems like a big ifference. But ripping out my gas stove and replacing it with an electric one would be pretty expensive, right?

Will Malloy: It would be – but that’s not the only way to switch from gas to electric.

Megan Hall: What do you mean?

Nat Hardy: Here’s how Stephen made the switch-

Stephen Porder: I think my mother in law got me an induction burner because she knew I was like, Mr. Environmental dude, and so we just put it on top of our gas stove. And I think it probably cost about 100 bucks but it cooks amazingly.

Megan Hall: That’s so straightforward.

Nat Hardy: Right? There’s no reason not to switch!

Megan Hall: But, but what if I just like cooking on my gas stove?

Will Malloy: You’re definitely not alone. That’s something that comes up a lot. People don’t want to give up the stove they know and love.

Nat Hardy: But cooking on induction burners can actually be pretty great –

Stephen Porder: It cooks super fast. It boils water super fast, like it’s very controllable. So on this particular induction plate, for example, there were 20 different heat settings that you could use for a pan.

Will Malloy: One study that gave  induction stoves to households in New York found that people ended up really liking them – the investigators offered to switch the stoves back to gas after the study was over, but every single household wanted to keep their new induction stove.

Megan Hall: Okay! I’ll have to check that out. Thanks, Will and Nat!

That’s it for today. You can find more information, or ask a question about the way your choices affect our planet, at askpossibly.org. You can also subscribe to Possibly wherever you get your podcasts or follow us on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, X, or Bluesky at  “askpossibly”

Possibly is a co-production of Brown University’s Institute for Environment and Society, Brown’s Climate Solutions Initiative, and The Public’s Radio.

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Turkeys are more than just a Thanksgiving meal, they’re part of forest ecosystems across the country. In this episode of Possibly, we take a look at how they made a major comeback in New England after being driven to local extinction.

Megan Hall: Welcome to Possibly, where we take on huge problems like the future of our planet and break them down into small questions with unexpected answers. I’m Megan Hall.

Where I live in Rhode Island, turkeys are more than just a Thanksgiving treat, they’re a neighbor. I feel like I see them everywhere – including wandering the streets near my house. But they haven’t always been doing so well. In fact, wild turkeys were locally extinct for many decades.

Possibly reporters Will Malloy and Nat Hardy took a look into how they made their comeback.

Will Malloy: Hi Megan!

Nat Hardy: Hello!

Megan Hall: So turkeys – where did they go and how did they come back?

Will Malloy: Like you, Megan, I was surprised to learn that there were no turkeys in Rhode Island as recently as the 1980s – my friends and I even saw a bunch running around in the road the other day.

Nat Hardy: Lizzi Bonczek, Upland Game Bird Biologist for the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management, says that turkeys are a natural part of our environment.

Lizzi Bonczek: Before colonial settlement, there was just vast amounts of of woods.

Will Malloy: Indigenous people used practices like controlled burns to keep the forests in a mix of different stages. Most areas had thick woods with parts cleared for farming.

Nat Hardy: This kind of mix gave turkeys different places to search for food, nest, and raise their chicks.

Will Malloy: But when European settlers arrived, they clear-cut about two-thirds of the state’s forests for farming.

Nat Hardy: Which was bad news for the turkeys.

Will Malloy: Plus, early settlers hunted them for food and over time, turkey populations shrunk.  By the early 1900s, there were no turkeys left in Rhode Island.

Nat Hardy: And the same thing happened all over New England.

Lizzi Bonczek: Vermont, Maine, Connecticut. Crazy to think about. No turkeys on the landscape.

Megan Hall: That’s unbelievable! How did they come back?

Will Malloy: Lots of people abandoned their farms, which gradually turned back into forests. Rhode Island also introduced hunting rules that protected wildlife.

Nat Hardy: In the 1960s, many New England states began to reintroduce turkeys, hoping that those forests were strong enough to support them again.

Will Malloy: And in 1980, the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management and the National Wild Turkey Federation teamed up to release 29 turkeys in Exeter, Rhode Island.

Megan: Wait, where did they get those turkeys?

Nat Hardy: From Vermont actually! A decade earlier, the state had relocated a flock of turkeys from New York. And so by 1980 even Vermont had turkeys to spare!

Megan Hall: So they literally caught a flock of turkeys there and brought them into Rhode Island?

Will Malloy: Yes!

Megan Hall: How did the turkeys do?

Will Malloy: Pretty well, actually.

Nat Hardy: The state kept the program going and released flocks around the state over the next 10 years.

Will Malloy: And since then the population has continued to grow. But scientists are still keeping a close eye on the turkeys, to make sure they’re doing ok.

Megan Hall: So I guess this is a success story?

Nat Hardy: Yeah! For sure.

Will Malloy: First of all, it’s a great example of how states can work together to solve environmental and ecological problems.

Lizzi Bonczek: The reintroduction, really was this whole regional collaboration between, the states that have turkeys, the states that don’t have turkeys, the federal agencies that oversee these laws.

Nat Hardy: Plus, Lizzi says, there’s just something that feels good about living in a place where you get to see all sorts of animals, in your own neighborhood!

Lizzi Bonczek: And so I was driving along, and I noticed in the woodline there was a flock of turkeys. They were all kind of in the shade, and I just, like, sat there for a while with my binoculars and just watched them be turkeys. One was sitting on a log, preening another one. They’re kind of, you know, poking around, probably looking for seeds or bugs. There’s that, right, intrinsic value I was talking about, of just enjoying watching wildlife be wild.

Will Malloy: So, when I’m eating turkey this Thanksgiving, I’ll be feeling a little extra grateful for these guys.

Megan Hall: Same here. Thanks Will and Nat!

That’s it for today. You can find more information, or ask a question about the way your choices affect our planet, at askpossibly.org. You can also subscribe to Possibly wherever you get your podcasts or follow us on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn or X at  “askpossibly”

Possibly is a co-production of Brown University’s Institute for Environment and Society, Brown’s Climate Solutions Initiative, and the Public’s Radio.

The post Wild turkeys were locally extinct for decades. How did they come back? appeared first on TPR: The Public’s Radio.

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Plankton form the basis of the food web in oceans and new research shows that the level of phytoplankton in Rhode Island’s Narragansett Bay has dropped by half in the past 60 years. We wondered why.

Megan Hall: Welcome to Possibly, where we take on huge problems like the future of our planet and break them down into small questions with unexpected answers. I’m Megan Hall.

The ocean is full of life, big and small. Today, we’re going to talk about some of the little guys – specifically, a type of plankton. These tiny organisms play a big role in the health of Rhode Island’s Narragansett Bay, and there’s new research out about how they’re changing.

Possibly reporters Will Malloy and Nat Hardy are here to explain. Hi guys!

Will Malloy: Hi Megan!

Nat Hardy: Hi!

Megan Hall: So, before we talk about this new research, can we just back up a bit? What are plankton and why do we care about how they’re doing?

Will Malloy: There are tons of different kinds of plankton, but this big study looked at the amount of phytoplankton in Narragansett Bay.

Megan Hall: And what are phytoplankton?

Nat Hardy: They’re essentially microscopic algae that drift through the water/

Will Malloy: And they are super important.

Megan Hall: Why?

Will Malloy: For one, they’re the bottom of the food chain for all kinds of creatures in the ocean – the same way plants are on land.

Tatiana Rynearson: Zooplankton, the animal plankton, eat the phytoplankton, and then fish and other organisms eat the zooplankton. Also filter feeders, all those great oysters that people love, mussels, quahogs, they all filter feed phytoplankton

Nat Hardy: That’s Tatiana Rynearson, a professor at the University of Rhode Island.

Will Malloy: Even if you don’t like quahogs, you still rely on phytoplankton. They create oxygen the same way trees and plants do on land.

Tricia Thibodeau: Every time you take a breath, you can thank the ocean, because phytoplankton produce about 50% of the oxygen that we breathe.

Nat Hardy: That’s Tricia Thibodeau, a professor at the University of New England who works with Tatiana to study these little creatures.

Will Malloy: For 60 years, they’ve been taking weekly samples to measure the amount of plankton in the Bay.

Nat Hardy: And a 60 year study can show you things that you might miss in a shorter one, which is super valuable, especially for understanding long-term things like climate change.

Will Malloy: For example –

Tatiana Rynearson: We found that phytoplankton are decreasing

Megan Hall: By how much?

Will Malloy: Between the 1960s and 2010’s, the amount of phytoplankton in the water fell by half.

Megan Hall: That sounds like a lot. Why is this happening?

Will Malloy: Tricia and Tatiana say they weren’t able to pinpoint just one cause –

Tricia Thibodeau: We found that this long-term decline was connected to many different factors, including long-term temperature increases in Narragansett Bay

Nat Hardy: So it seems to be climate change related. But lots of things were changing at once, so it’s hard to figure out the exact reason we’re seeing this decrease.

Will Malloy: But this drop is happening in other places, too, like the Gulf of Maine and even as far away as Australia.

Nat Hardy: The authors wondered if this decline had anything to do with the way Rhode Island has reduced the amount of wastewater running into the bay.

Megan Hall: What would that have to do with it?

Will Malloy: Wastewater can carry nutrients like lawn fertilizer into bodies of water, which in turn, can cause algae to grow.

Nat Hardy: But this study found that improved sewage treatment probably wasn’t the main cause of the decrease in plankton –

Tricia Thibodeau: we found that there’s been a long-term decline in phytoplankton occurring since before the time when a lot of this wastewater treatment was induced

Megan Hall: Okay, so we’re not exactly sure why we’re seeing fewer phytoplankton in Narragansett Bay. But should we be worried?

Will Malloy: I don’t think that’s the message here. The Bay is changing in lots of ways – it’s cleaner now and the water’s warmer.

Nat Hardy: And the more the climate warms up, the less we can predict about how these living systems will respond.

Will Malloy: That’s part of why studies like this are crucial. This one is one of the longest-running of its kind.

Tricia Thibodeau: It allows Narragansett Bay to really be a model ecosystem, to understand how changes here could affect or look in other ecosystems as well

Will Malloy: Long-term studies like this help paint a better picture of how places like Narragansett Bay are changing over time.

Megan Hall: Got it! That’s it for today. You can find more information, or ask a question about the way your choices affect our planet, at askpossibly.org. You can also subscribe to Possibly wherever you get your podcasts or follow us on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn or X at  “askpossibly”

Possibly is a co-production of The Public’s Radio, Brown University’s Institute for Environment and Society and Brown’s Climate Solutions Initiative.

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