June 2016, Plastics in the Marine Environment, Eunomia Research & Consulting Ltd

Platics in the Marine Environment: Where do they come from ? Where do they go ?

Here is a short report published by Eunomia with an infographic part to highlight the principal sources of plastic in oceans.

• " Over 80% of the annual input comes from land-based sources."
• " 94% of the plastic that enters the ocean ends up on the sea floor."
• " Barely 1% of marine plastics are found floating at or near the ocean surface, with an average global concentration of less than        1 kg/km2."
• " By contrast, the amount estimated to be on beaches globally is five time greater, and importantly, the concentration is much higher, at 2,000 kg/km2."

This report seems to point out that regular beach cleaning efforts are more efficient than removing plastics floating in mid-ocean, good news right ?

Taxonomy

• Marine litter
• Beach Sampling
• Beach Cleaning

1 Comment

1. Thank you Kim van Arkel  for this interesting and compelling report. In the conclusion, they mention limitations to the data available regarding the amount of plastic debris that are trapped in organisms or in sea ice. Those debris are therefore not on the beaches, nor on ocean surface nor on ocean floor... It could be that the pollution is actually far greater! Any data on that?