Plastic contamination has been reported in all realms of the environment from the tropics to the polar oceans. Our poor knowledge of plastics sources, pathways and hot spots of accumulation prevents an assessment of risks to ecosystems and human health and the development of appropriate mitigation strategies. In order to understand current distributions of plastics and the way they evolve in space and time, much better observations and common consistent measuring methods are required but simultaneously, observations must be systematically combined with computational models
The session aims to set up a forum for multi-disciplinary discussions to create a global picture of plastic contamination in the environment and to suggest approaches for future research, monitoring and mitigation of plastic pollutions impacts. The session will provide a platform for discussions to advise policy and industry on the best ways to assess potential harm to the environment and human health from this contaminant.
This session will draw together research on plastic contamination across all sizes of plastics from shelf seas to the deep ocean including ice covered seas. The forum will facilitate combining observations with state-of-the-art computational modelling to promote the fast advance of research and improve our understanding of how plastic pollution affects environments worldwide. We invite contributions on field and remote observations, laboratory experiments, novel modelling approaches, related scientific initiatives and projects. New ideas for citizen-science involvement and for mitigation strategies to reduce plastic contamination of the environment are especially welcome.