As if we needed further evidence that we are recklessly befouling our planet, The Independent has a disturbing article about an area of floating plastic waste twice the size of the United States in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.

The vast expanse of debris -- in effect the world's largest rubbish dump -- is held in place by swirling underwater currents. This drifting "soup" stretches from about 500 nautical miles off the Californian coast, across the northern Pacific, past Hawaii and almost as far as Japan.

Charles Moore discovered it by accident in 1997 taking a shortcut back across the Pacific after a yacht competition.

He was astonished to find himself surrounded by rubbish, day after day, thousands of miles from land. "Every time I came on deck, there was trash floating by," he said in an interview. "How could we have fouled such a huge area? How could this go on for a week?"

This stuff won't degrade for hundreds of years at the minimum. Ugh.