Microplastics are raining down from the sky
Scientists discover large amounts of tiny plastic particles falling out of the air in a remote mountain location.
In what looks like a pristine, remote mountain region, tiny pieces of plastic pollution were found raining down from the sky—raising questions about the global extent of plastic pollution—a first-of-its-kind study has found.
Scientists recorded a daily rate of 365 microplastic particles per square meter falling from the sky in the Pyrenees Mountains in southern France.
“It was incredible how much microplastic was being deposited,” said Deonie Allen, a researcher at EcoLab in the School of Agricultural and Life Sciences in Toulouse, France. There were no obvious sources for the microplastics within 60 miles (100 kilometers), said Allen, the lead author of the study published Monday in Nature Geoscience.
“Microplastic is a new atmospheric pollutant,” Allen said. (Read more about
