With the growing number of people on the planet, so grows the amount of trash and garbage we all produce. And so also grows the awareness we all have about where it is, where it comes from and where it is going. Who owns trash? Is it a commodity that can be bought and sold and stored (buried/burned/etc.) anywhere? Can it be sold from one country or town to another? At what cost? Who gets the money?

MIT researchers are currently putting together a project that will track trash from when you throw it into the trash can until it finds its final resting place, giving you live tracking of where it goes and when it gets there. In the meantime, we still don’t know much about the mammoth amounts of trash the world’s citizens produce and where they go- or why.

According to Reuters, Brazil and the UK have been locked in an ongoing battle about this very issue as trash from the UK sits off the coast of Brazil and Brzil is about to make a controversial and costly call to send the garbage packing, back across the Atlantic- 89 shipping containers full, to be exact. By this point, after making the journey across the ocean and sitting for an inconceivably long time off the coast (some have been there since November of 2008- that’s at least 8 months) while legal wranglings have been going on, the garbage is rotting and gross and stinking and making a general very public nuisance of itself.

The UK is issuing over $400,000 in fines to the 3 companies and Brazil is fining them as well- bad news for Stefenon Estrategia e Marketing, Bes Assessoria e Comercio Exterior and Alphatec, the companies that imported the 1,600 tons of trash.

But how does that much garbage get sent half way across the world on cargo ships only to be stopped at port? Well, it’s a predictably long story. The trash contains everything you would expect in trash- from toilet seats and dirty diapers to used syringes and old electronics equipment.

To begin with, apparently the cargo was falsely declared as a shipment of plastic. When that proved not to be the case, the cargo was not allowed into Brazil and the IBAMA environment agency said the companies will have to send it back.

"If they don't send the rubbish back they will be fined (a daily rate) until this is resolved," said Ingrid Oberg, IBAMA head.

But who will pay for it to go back?

Well, the UK is fining the companies that shipped the garbage from the UK. The Brazilian companies apparently are saying they may help out. But in the end, nobody really knows where to point the finger on this one. That’s not true-

Nobody who has any power to do anything about it knows where to point the finger, for blame or for dollars. And I’m sure the people who negotiated the deal aren’t coming forward on this one-
Yeah! Me! I was the one who illegally shipped the plastic from the UK to Brazil! Sorry! I’ll fix it…