Closing the Mediterranean Marine Floating Plastic Mass Budget: Inverse Modeling of Sources and Sinks

Estimates of plastic inputs into the ocean are orders of magnitude larger than what is found in the surface waters. This can be due to discrepancies in the sources of plastic released into the ocean but can also be explained by the fact that it is not well-known what the most dominant sinks of marine plastics are and on what time scales these operate. To get a better understanding on possible sources and sinks, an inverse modeling methodology is presented here for a Lagrangian ocean model, estimating floating plastic quantities in the Mediterranean Sea. Field measurements of plastic concentrations in the Mediterranean are used to inform parametrizations defining various sources of marine plastics and removal of plastic particles because of beaching and sinking. The parameters of the model are found using inverse modeling, by comparison of model results and measurements of floating plastic concentrations. Time scales for the sinks are found, and likely sources of plastics can be ranked in importance. A new mass balance is made for floating plastics in the Mediterranean: for 2015, there is an estimated input of 2100-3400 tonnes, and of plastics released since 2006, about 170-420 tonnes remain afloat in the surface waters, 49-63% ended up on coastlines, and 37-51% have sunk down.