re: Map of the world showing mismanaged plastic waste

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There are a few areas that are not landlocked without data on the map.

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India is fricking gross. Those people are ruining the planet.

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Paper straws will save the earth

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I think many recycling companies in America actually export plastic to Asia (possibly other countries). Not sure what the hell they do with it from there, but seems ironic based on this image...

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The Helmholtz study, published in 2017, was widely misquoted by media as saying 90% of ocean plastic comes from just 10 rivers — eight in Asia and two in Africa. But what the authors estimated was just the plastic that washes in from rivers. They didn't count plastic that enters the sea from sources such as tsunami damage or fishing.

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The Jambeck study, published in 2015, found just four Asian countries — China, Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam — account for about half the plastic waste that flows from land into the ocean. Europe and North America make up less than 5% because they have better systems for getting rid of waste. Aside from what's burned or recycled, the plastic they throw away into closed landfills is unlikely to leak into rivers.

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River plastic emissions to the world’s oceans

Article | OPEN | Published: 07 June 2017

River plastic emissions to the world’s oceans

Laurent C. M. Lebreton

, Joost van der Zwet

[…]

Julia Reisser

Nature Communications volume8, Article number: 15611 (2017) | Download Citation

Abstract

Plastics in the marine environment have become a major concern because of their persistence at sea, and adverse consequences to marine life and potentially human health. Implementing mitigation strategies requires an understanding and quantification of marine plastic sources, taking spatial and temporal variability into account. Here we present a global model of plastic inputs from rivers into oceans based on waste management, population density and hydrological information. Our model is calibrated against measurements available in the literature. We estimate that between 1.15 and 2.41 million tonnes of plastic waste currently enters the ocean every year from rivers, with over 74% of emissions occurring between May and October. The top 20 polluting rivers, mostly located in Asia, account for 67% of the global total. The findings of this study provide baseline data for ocean plastic mass balance exercises, and assist in prioritizing future plastic debris monitoring and mitigation strategies.

Introduction

Results

River plastic mass inputs to oceans

We estimated that between 1.15 and 2.41 million tonnes of plastic currently flows from the global riverine system into the oceans every year (Fig. 1). The top 20 polluting rivers were mostly located in Asia (Table 1) and accounted for more than two thirds (67%) of the global annual input while covering 2.2% of the continental surface area and representing 21% of the global population. Furthermore, the top 122 polluting rivers (4% of total landmass surface area and 36% of global population) contributed for >90% of the plastic inputs with 103 rivers located in Asia, eight in Africa, eight in South and Central America, and one in Europe.

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