Our “Closer Looks” this week is about a first-of-its-kind-to-be-passed bill to ban toxic sunscreens. HI SB2571 bans the sale of sunscreen with oxybenzone and octinoxate, chemicals which “have significant harmful impacts on Hawaii’s marine environment and residing ecosystems, including coral reefs.”
The waters surrounding the Hawaiian Islands contain more than 410,000 acres of living coral reefs. Craig Downs, the executive director at the Haereticus Environmental Laboratory in Clifford, Virginia, found “oxybenzone is toxic to the symbiotic algae that live within coral that not only give the coral their color, but are vital in riding them of their waste and helping them get oxygen.” Without this algae, coral turns white. This “bleaching” is the first alarm indicating a coral reef may be dying. The loss of algae can also be dangerous to sea urchins, which subsequently affects the lives of the sea turtles who feed on sea urchins, and so on. The myriad effects are laid out in the bill.
Supporters of the bill point out many people who swim in Hawaii’s oceans are tourists and the reefs are one of the most popular attractions on the islands, thus this bill is striving to protect the Hawaiian economy in addition to its ecosystems. However, according to Hawaii State Senator Donna Mercado Kim, a sponsor of the bill, the ban is only “a first step to help our reef and protect it from deterioration. Hopefully, other jurisdictions will look at this legislation and follow suit.” Kim is saying that since this bill does not ban online purchases or tourists from bringing their own sunscreen, it does not completely address the issue of reef toxic sunscreen being used. Thus this bill is only a first step; other states will need to follow suit.
Opponents of the bill say there are many other things which pose significant threats to coral and marine life like global warming, overfishing, human contact, coastal development and runoff, and so on – and the state is not working to address those things. Other concerns center around what level of protection people receive from the sun using “acceptable” sunscreens and how the change in products will affect local shops.
A bill similar to this failed last year. If the governor signs this sunscreen legislation, Hawaii will be the first state in the nation to pass a measure of this magnitude, it would go into effect in 2021. Here is a list of all the bills in the nation that have to do with oxybenzone or octinoxate — so far, only in Hawaii as of when I’m writing this, but the list will stay updated going forward.