Suppose that a scientist estimates that every square mile of the ocean contains an

average of 4.6 × 104
pieces of trash. The area of the Earth’s surface that is
covered by oceans is approximately 1.2 × 108
square miles. Using the estimate,
how many pieces of trash are in the Earth’s oceans?

4 answers

4.6 * 104 = 478.4 pieces of trash per square mile of ocean

1.2 * 108 * 478.4 = ______ pieces of trash in the oceans
still dont understand .
Just plug this multiplication problem into a calculator.

You can also copy and paste that problem into the Google search box.
online, we use ^ for powers
copy/paste of superscripts does not usually work in plain text

So, how many pieces of trash?

4.6 × 10^4 pieces/mi^2 * 1.2 × 10^8 mi^2
= 4.6*1.2 × 10^4*10^8
= 5.52 × 10^12 pieces