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Global environmental plastics dispersal under OECD policy scenarios towards 2060
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Researchers modeled how global plastic pollution would spread through the environment under different policy scenarios developed by the OECD, looking ahead to 2060. They found that even with ambitious policy action, significant amounts of plastic will continue leaking into aquatic environments unless waste management improves dramatically worldwide. The study suggests that coordinated global policies targeting both plastic production and waste management are essential to curb environmental plastic pollution.
Plastics occupy a central role in the global economy, yet cause significant damage to ecosystems and human health. Recent studies and OECD reports have provided comprehensive roadmaps to reduce the environmental impacts of plastics, based on coordinated global action to reduce plastic consumption and improve waste management and recycling. Leakage of mismanaged plastic waste to aquatic environments, including the ocean, is a key policy variable, yet not well constrained in plastics life cycle analysis. Here we use a coupled land-ocean-atmosphere box model to simulate global plastic and microplastic dispersal for different policy scenarios. We update the global plastic and microplastic budget for the year 2015. Based on a revised estimate of the total marine plastic pool of 263 Tg, we constrain land to sea transport of plastics at 14 Tg y-1 for the year 2015, implying 4 to 7 times larger leakage than OECD estimates. Model simulation of two ‘global action’ policy scenarios, attaining near-zero mismanaged waste and >50% recycling by 2060, show a peak in land to sea transport of total plastics of 23 Tg y-1 around 2045 and a decrease thereafter. Land to sea transfer of microplastic, however, remains high during the 21st century due to its continued supply from the fragmentation of legacy mismanaged waste on land. Consequently, exposure to small microplastic, <300 μm, in air, terrestrial runoff, marine waters and sediment is estimated to increase 3 to 6-fold by 2060, compared to 2019, and can only be curbed by including remediation of terrestrial mismanaged plastic waste in policy scenarios.
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Global environmental plastic dispersal under OECD policy scenarios toward 2060
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Using a global computer model, researchers simulated how plastic pollution will spread through land, ocean, and atmosphere under different policy scenarios through 2060. Even with strong policy action, microplastics already in the environment will continue to circulate for centuries because existing plastic slowly breaks into smaller pieces. The study estimated the total marine plastic pool at 263 million tons, showing that preventing new pollution is critical but will not quickly solve the microplastic problem already in our ecosystems.
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Researchers modeled five different intervention scenarios for reducing global plastic pollution between 2016 and 2040 and found that even implementing all feasible solutions would only cut pollution rates by 40% compared to 2016 levels. Under a business-as-usual scenario, 710 million metric tons of plastic waste would still accumulate in ecosystems even with immediate action. The study makes clear that coordinated global efforts across consumption reduction, recycling, waste collection, and innovation are urgently needed.
Global Plastics Outlook: Plastic leakage to the environment - projections (Edition 2022)
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This dataset presents OECD projections for global plastic leakage into the environment from 2019 to 2060 under baseline and policy scenarios, covering both microplastics and macroplastics. The projections show that without strong policy action, the amount of plastic entering environments where it fragments into microplastics will continue to grow substantially.
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This study assessed the impact of waste reduction, waste management, and environmental recovery strategies on global plastic emissions for 173 countries, estimating that 19–23 million metric tons entered aquatic ecosystems in 2016. Even with current governmental commitments, annual emissions could reach 53 million metric tons by 2030, indicating that extraordinary transformation of the global plastics economy is needed.
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