Mid-Atlantic Marine Debris Summit

The Mid-Atlantic Marine Debris Summit brought together states and researchers and environmental organizations with a common goal of reducing marine debris.

We met with folks from nearby states to discuss shared challenges and effective campaigns for preventing common litter contributors to marine debris, including balloon releases and littered cigarette filters.

We’re excited about the opportunities to leverage effective community based social marketing campaigns to make headway against these pernicious types of litter.

We also heard about current research on microfibers and the need to monitor microplastic loading into our bays and waterways that lead to the ocean. This reaffirms our commitment to the comments we submitted this summer on the draft revised Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement. We called for more action to monitor and reduce microplastics in the Chesapeake Bay, starting by leveraging existing monitoring networks and partnerships. We would like to see a goal of no net increase of microplastics, but we need to know a baseline and identify sources so that we can measure progress toward the goal. Leveraging existing monitoring networks would be a way to get more out of current infrastructure and monitoring investments by taking advantage of existing knowledge and pollutant loading models.

Approximately 80% of marine debris comes from land-based sources, so every piece counts when we’re doing our cleanups and designing policies to eliminate sources of trash and litter across Maryland.