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Nurdles are tiny plastic pellets used by the plastics industry. Roughly the same size as a lentil, they are melted down and moulded into a variety of plastic products. But as nurdles are produced and shipped around the world, every year about 230,000 tonnes leak into the wider environment, according to a survey by environmental charity Fidra<\/a>.<\/p>\n One cargo ship spill alone in May 2021 released 1,500 tonnes<\/a> of nurdles into the Indian Ocean. Like other microplastics, nurdles pose a threat to marine life as they tend to absorb toxic chemicals and can easily be ingested by animals who mistake them for food.<\/p>\n Read more:<\/strong><\/p>\n Asked by: Mai Huynh, West Midlands<\/strong><\/p>\n To submit your questions email us at questions@sciencefocus.com (don\u2019t forget to include your name and location)<\/em><\/p>\n By Alexandra Franklin-Cheung Published: Monday, 28 March 2022 at 12:00 am Nurdles are tiny plastic pellets used by the plastics industry. Roughly the same size as a lentil, they are melted down and moulded into a variety of plastic products. But as nurdles are produced and shipped around the world, every year about 230,000 tonnes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":11088,"template":"","categories":[30],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"< 1"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/03\/what-are-nurdles.jpg",1200,536,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/03\/what-are-nurdles-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/03\/what-are-nurdles-300x134.jpg",300,134,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/03\/what-are-nurdles-768x343.jpg",768,343,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/03\/what-are-nurdles-1024x457.jpg",800,357,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/03\/what-are-nurdles.jpg",1200,536,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/03\/what-are-nurdles.jpg",1200,536,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"By Alexandra Franklin-Cheung Published: Monday, 28 March 2022 at 12:00 am Nurdles are tiny plastic pellets used by the plastics industry. Roughly the same size as a lentil, they are melted down and moulded into a variety of plastic products. But as nurdles are produced and shipped around the world, every year about 230,000 tonnes…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/11087"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11088"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11087"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11087"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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