Cigarette butts in beach litter: Snapshot of a summer holiday

Abstract

Cigarette butts are considered the most common form of personal litter around the world. It is estimated that 5.5 trillion cigarettes are consumed globally each year and that 4.95 trillion are discarded in some natural or anthropic environment around the world. This study evaluated the pollution of urban beaches in the Brazilian Northeast by cigarette butts in relation to other types of litter. Samplings were conducted in a month of high season (January 2016), at eight heavily used beaches. In the place with the highest concentration of users in each beach, a 200 m transect (3 m width) was established parallel to the water on the most recent strandline. All items >1 cm were counted and classified into categories according to composition (plastic, cigarette butts, wood, glass, metal, paper and organic, such as food leftovers and coconuts) using a standard worksheet. Cigarette butts were considered as an isolated category of litter. A total of 10,880 items was registered. The most abundant items were plastics (44.96%) and cigarette butts (38.36%). Among plastics, the most abundant items were straws, metallic food packaging, sticks (lollipop and popsicle) and cups. Plastic fragments were also abundant in all beaches evaluated, corresponding to 14.5% of the total plastics.