Legacy community science data suggest reduced beached litter in response to a container deposit scheme at a local scale

Abstract

Marine debris is causing significant environmental harm. Legislation is being implemented to reduce litter, including schemes like container deposit legislation that incentivize the return of commonly littered items for recycling. While there is a suggestion that these schemes reduce litter, no study has examined the long-term impact on the local environment before and after implementation. This study analyses community science data from 8 years prior to the implementation of a container deposit scheme, paired with 3 years of data afterwards, to assess the scheme's effectiveness at a local scale. Although using legacy datasets limits the generalizability of the conclusions compared to dedicated studies, the findings strongly indicate that container deposit schemes effectively manage targeted containers but have little impact on overall waste abundances. Long-term datasets like these are invaluable for assessing the impact of management efforts.