Message in a bottle – The story of floating plastic in the eastern Mediterranean sea

Galia Pasternak; Dov Zviely; Asaf Ariel; Ehud Spanier; Christine A. Ribic

doi:10.1016/j.wasman.2018.04.034

Message in a bottle – The story of floating plastic in the eastern Mediterranean sea

Galia Pasternak, Dov Zviely, Asaf Ariel, Ehud Spanier, Christine A. Ribic

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

The Mediterranean Sea is a closed basin with limited water exchange through the Strait of Gibraltar, and sites along its shores show the greatest densities of marine debris in the world. Plastic bottles, which are a growing concern due to high consumption of soft drinks and bottled water, constitute most of the floating marine debris. In this paper we present the transport mechanisms of floating marine debris to and from the Israeli coast using an experimental offshore release and recovery of plastic bottles, with the participation of citizens. Many bottles released near the beach in the south part of Israel, returned to the beach at a short distance and time from the release point. Some release locations had no bottle returns. Ten bottles, released from three locations, were recovered many dozens to hundreds of kilometers from the release point. Since most of the westward water flow in the eastern Mediterranean is subsurface, it was not surprising to find our floating debris only in the east. That makes the Levant basin in the eastern Mediterranean a collection area for floating debris.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	67-77
Number of pages	11
Journal	Waste Management
Volume	77
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2018.04.034
State	Published - Jul 2018

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
Research reported in this publication was supported by EcoOcean, an Israeli non-governmental organization, and partially supported by a Sir Mauriceand Lady Irene Hatter Research Grant for Maritime Studies to the first author. At the time of publication, the data have not been published by the funding agency. Any use of trade, product, or firm names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Government. The research team would like to thank everyone who reported bottle finding to us.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2018 Elsevier Ltd

Keywords

Environmental protection
Floating marine debris
Marine pollution
Plastic

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Waste Management and Disposal

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Access to Document

10.1016/j.wasman.2018.04.034

Cite this

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title = "Message in a bottle – The story of floating plastic in the eastern Mediterranean sea",

abstract = "The Mediterranean Sea is a closed basin with limited water exchange through the Strait of Gibraltar, and sites along its shores show the greatest densities of marine debris in the world. Plastic bottles, which are a growing concern due to high consumption of soft drinks and bottled water, constitute most of the floating marine debris. In this paper we present the transport mechanisms of floating marine debris to and from the Israeli coast using an experimental offshore release and recovery of plastic bottles, with the participation of citizens. Many bottles released near the beach in the south part of Israel, returned to the beach at a short distance and time from the release point. Some release locations had no bottle returns. Ten bottles, released from three locations, were recovered many dozens to hundreds of kilometers from the release point. Since most of the westward water flow in the eastern Mediterranean is subsurface, it was not surprising to find our floating debris only in the east. That makes the Levant basin in the eastern Mediterranean a collection area for floating debris.",

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Message in a bottle – The story of floating plastic in the eastern Mediterranean sea

Abstract

Bibliographical note

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

UN SDGs

Access to Document

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