Microplastic Pollution in the Great Lakes: State, Federal, and Common Law Solutions

The world's waterbodies have experienced the effects of plastic pollution for many years.Shorelines and beaches around the world have long been littered with plastic trash.In recent years, the development of large garbage patches in the world's oceans, including the Eastern Pacific Ocean garbage patch, which has received extensive media coverage,' and another somewhat smaller one in the Atlantic, 2 have grabbed our collective attention.Scientists and researchers have recently shifted their focus to the Great Lakes to determine the extent of plastic pollution in the world's largest source of fresh water.The first major scientific paper on Great Lakes plastic pollution was published in the Marine Pollution Bulletin, and the results are deeply troubling.The study, a collaborative effort between the 5 Gyres Institute and State University of New York Fredonia, revealed high concentrations of plastics, particularly microplastics, in the Great Lakes.Microplastics are those plastics that are less than one millimeter in diameter.4 Microplastics can be separated into two categories.The first category constitutes plastics that are less than five millimeters long and come from *