Plastic Pollution in the World's Oceans: More than 5 Trillion Plastic Pieces Weighing over 250,000 Tons Afloat at Sea

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ID: 114305
2014
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Abstract
Plastic pollution is ubiquitous throughout the marine environment, yet estimates of the global abundance and weight of floating plastics have lacked data, particularly from the Southern Hemisphere and remote regions. Here we report an estimate of the total number of plastic particles and their weight floating in the world's oceans from 24 expeditions (2007–2013) across all five sub-tropical gyres, costal Australia, Bay of Bengal and the Mediterranean Sea conducting surface net tows (N = 680) and visual survey transects of large plastic debris (N = 891). Using an oceanographic model of floating debris dispersal calibrated by our data, and correcting for wind-driven vertical mixing, we estimate a minimum of 5.25 trillion particles weighing 268,940 tons. When comparing between four size classes, two microplastic 4.75 mm, a tremendous loss of microplastics is observed from the sea surface compared to expected rates of fragmentation, suggesting there are mechanisms at play that remove
Reference Key
eriksen2014plosplastic Use this key to autocite in the manuscript while using SciMatic Manuscript Manager or Thesis Manager
Authors Marcus Eriksen;Laurent C. M. Lebreton;Henry S. Carson;Martin Thiel;Charles J. Moore;Jose C. Borerro;Francois Galgani;Peter G. Ryan;Julia Reisser;
Journal PloS one
Year 2014
DOI
10.1371/journal.pone.0111913
URL
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0111913
Keywords
Southern Hemisphere body weight indian ocean mediterranean sea water pollution density marine conservation oceans

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