Coastal margins and backshores represent a major sink for marine debris
Insights from a continental-scale analysis
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 15548461 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Arianna Olivelli (0000-0003-1068-4429, Utrecht University, corresponding author), Britta Denise Hardesty (0000-0003-1948-5098, CSIRO Oceans and Atmosphere), Chris Wilcox (0000-0002-5983-657X, CSIRO Oceans and Atmosphere) |
| Year | 2020 |
| Volume | 15 |
| Issue | 7 |
| Pages | 074037-074037 |
| Publication date | 2020-02-20 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Environmental Research Letters (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1748-9326 • E-ISSN: 1748-9326 |
| Publisher | IOP Publishing (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1088/1748-9326/ab7836 |
| OpenAlex | W3008793473 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 5 |
| References cited | 37 |
Marine debris represents a major threat for the environment. Plastic production is increasing exponentially and causing an unprecedented growth of plastic pollution entering the marine environment. Hence, a thorough assessment of debris accumulation areas is required to address the longstanding question about where is all the missing plastic. Most research on marine debris sinks to date has focused on oceanic gyres, the water column, seabeds and wildlife. Relatively little has focused on the potential of coastal areas as debris sinks. To address this knowledge gap, the spatial distribution of debris from the waterline to the backshore was modelled from a continental-scale dataset of coastal debris distribution from 635 surveys across Australia. Results showed that the distribution of debris is significantly correlated with oceanic and atmospheric processes (i.e. onshore Stokes drift and wind), and coastal usage for recreational activities (i.e. regional population and distance to the nearest road). Debris density and size increased from the waterline to the backshore, indicating that the backshore area represents an important debris sink, especially for larger sized items
Cartography · Continental shelf · Debris · Geography · Marine debris · Ocean gyre · Physical geography · Sink (geography · Waterline · Environmental Science · Microplastics and Plastic Pollution · Recycling and Waste Management Techniques · Ecology · Geology · Oceanography
A spatially variable scarcity of floating microplastics in the eastern North Pacific Ocean
An inshore–offshore sorting system revealed from global classification of ocean litter
Contemporary Archaeology as a Framework for Investigating the Impact of Disposable Plastic Bags on Environmental Pollution in Galápagos
Socioeconomics effects on global hotspots of common debris items on land and the seafloor
Floating microplastic loads in the nearshore revealed through citizen science
Model Selection and Multimodel Inference
Evidence that the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is rapidly accumulating plastic
Plastic Pollution in the World's Oceans
The pollution of the marine environment by plastic debris
Future scenarios of global plastic waste generation and disposal
Plastic waste inputs from land into the ocean
Lost at Sea
A brief guide to model selection, multimodel inference and model averaging in behavioural ecology using Akaike’s information criterion
Plastics, the environment and human health
River plastic emissions to the world’s oceans
Plastics packaging and coastal pollution
A global inventory of small floating plastic debris
| Unique citing works | 5 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,83 |
| Citation span | 2020 - 2022 (3) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 5 |