Study Estimates 270,000 Tons Of Plastic Floating In Oceans

Nearly 270,000 tons of plastic is floating in the world's ocean, according to a new study. The amount of plastic is enough to full more than 38,500 garbage trucks. 

The study is an attempt to find how much of synthetic material is entering the oceans and how it is affecting the marine life and ecosystem. 

Researchers dragged a mesh net at the sea surface to gather small pieces while observers on the boat were asked to count the bigger items. Researchers then used computer models to calculate estimates for tracts of oceans not surveyed. 

"There's much more plastic pollution out there than recent estimates suggest," said Marcus Eriksen, research director for the Los Angeles-based 5 Gyres Institute, which studies this kind of pollution.

"It's everything you can imagine made of plastic," added Eriksen. "It's like Walmart or Target set afloat."

According to the study, 92 percent of the plastic comes in the form of 'microplastic' - particles from larger items made brittle by sunlight and pounded to pieces by waves, bitten by sharks and other wise torn apart. 

The study gathered data from expeditions to all five subtropical gyres, Coastal Australia, the Bay of Bengal and the Mediterranean Sea. It found that there are 5.25 trillion particles of plastic litter. 

Tiny plastic particles, down to the size of a sand grain have reached even remote polar region. 

The study has been published in the journal PLOS ONE.