"We find plastics everywhere from the Arctic to the Antarctic; from the tops of mountains to the ocean floor," she said. Satellites have lon

New satellite tool scans for plastic pollution on beaches from over 600 kilometres above Earth

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2024-11-01 14:30:15

"We find plastics everywhere from the Arctic to the Antarctic; from the tops of mountains to the ocean floor," she said.

Satellites have long been used to track plastic in the ocean but have struggled to accurately spot pollution against a sandy background.

Dr Guffogg's algorithm – called the Beached Plastic Debris Index – was precisely calibrated to catch the small differences in how light is reflected between sand, plastic and water.

The squares in Gippsland were an important test: each was smaller than the satellite's pixel size of 3 square metres and made of different kinds of plastic.

"Recent estimates [suggest] there's roughly the same number of plastic items floating in our oceans now as there are stars in our Milky Way," she said.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch – a swirling trash mass three times bigger than France – is the most famous example, but Dr Guffogg said the increasing volume of plastic waste being dumped means more hotspots will constantly pop up on land and at sea.