Data

Plastic Pollution in the World’s Oceans (2007-2013)

Australian Ocean Data Network
CSIRO O&A, Information & Data Centre (Point of contact) Marcus Eriksen (Author)
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ctx_ver=Z39.88-2004&rft_val_fmt=info%3Aofi%2Ffmt%3Akev%3Amtx%3Adc&rfr_id=info%3Asid%2FANDS&rft_id=https://marlin.csiro.au/geonetwork/srv/eng/catalog.search#/metadata/DA83B0E3-2B75-48A2-8FDD-874EDD9DBDBF&rft.title=Plastic Pollution in the World’s Oceans (2007-2013)&rft.identifier=DA83B0E3-2B75-48A2-8FDD-874EDD9DBDBF&rft.publisher=Australian Ocean Data Network&rft.description=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, coastal Australia, Bay of Bengal and the Mediterranean Sea conducting surface net tows (N5680) and visual survey transects of large plastic debris (N5891). 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 Maintenance and Update Frequency: notPlannedStatement: The data was provided by Laurent Lebreton and full methods are described in the cited paper (doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0111913). The source data are available at figshare.com. Eriksen, Marcus; Reisser, Julia; Galgani, Francois; Moore, Charles; Ryan, Peter; Carson, Hank; Thiel, Martin (2014): Plastic Marine Pollution Global Dataset. figshare. http://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.1015289&rft.creator=Marcus Eriksen&rft.date=2016&rft.coverage=westlimit=180; southlimit=-90; eastlimit=-180; northlimit=90; projection=WGS 84 (EPSG:4326)&rft.coverage=westlimit=180; southlimit=-90; eastlimit=-180; northlimit=90; projection=WGS 84 (EPSG:4326)&rft_rights= https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/au/&rft_rights=https://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc/3.0/au/88x31.png&rft_rights=WWW:LINK-1.0-http--related&rft_rights=License Graphic&rft_rights=Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Australia&rft_rights=WWW:LINK-1.0-http--related&rft_rights=License Text&rft_rights=Data was sourced from the NESP Marine Biodiversity Hub - The Marine Biodiversity Hub is supported through funding from the Australian Government's National Environmental Science Program (NESP), administered by the Department of the Environment (DOE).&rft_rights=Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Australia&rft_rights= https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/au/&rft_subject=environment&rft_subject=oceans&rft_subject=Oceans | Water Quality | Ocean Contaminants&rft.type=dataset&rft.language=English Access the data
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Data was sourced from the NESP Marine Biodiversity Hub - The Marine Biodiversity Hub is supported through funding from the Australian Government's National Environmental Science Program (NESP), administered by the Department of the Environment (DOE).

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Brief description

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, coastal Australia, Bay of Bengal and the Mediterranean Sea conducting surface net tows (N5680) and visual survey transects of large plastic debris (N5891). 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 and meso- and macroplastic >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 <4.75 mm plastic particles from the ocean surface.

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Maintenance and Update Frequency: notPlanned
Statement: The data was provided by Laurent Lebreton and full methods are described in the cited paper (doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0111913). The source data are available at figshare.com. Eriksen, Marcus; Reisser, Julia; Galgani, Francois; Moore, Charles; Ryan, Peter; Carson, Hank; Thiel, Martin (2014): Plastic Marine Pollution Global Dataset. figshare. http://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.1015289

Notes

Credit
National Environmental Science Program (NESP) Marine Biodiversity Hub

Created: 2015

Issued: 04 03 2016

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text: westlimit=180; southlimit=-90; eastlimit=-180; northlimit=90; projection=WGS 84 (EPSG:4326)

Subjects
Oceans | Water Quality | Ocean Contaminants | environment | oceans |

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Other Information
NESP Marine Biodiversity Hub Project C1 website

uri : https://www.nespmarine.edu.au/project/project-c1-improving-our-understanding-pressures-marine-environment

NESP Project C1 [ANDS RDA record]

purl : https://purl.org/au-research/grants/nesp/mb/c1

global : 9130534d-34d1-4b18-a255-668d4b04b1a1

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  • global : DA83B0E3-2B75-48A2-8FDD-874EDD9DBDBF
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