After the floods of the past week, a huge amount of rubbish has been dragged along. The question now is how big the impact is and where it all ends up.
Hydrologist Tim van Emmerik of Wageningen University says in the NOS Radio 1 News that it concerns an enormous amount of plastic and other waste. Van Emmerik and his team have already started taking measurements of the pollution in the Meuse over the weekend. In the coming weeks, the focus will be on where the waste goes and where it accumulates.
“Experience shows that waste accumulates in nature reserves that we all find very beautiful, such as the Biesbosch”, says Van Emmerik. The troop usually remains in vegetation, in floodplains and on banks. Volunteers from, among others, the Schone Rivieren and Schone Maas projects and people from Rijkswaterstaat will help to clean up the mess.
Damage ships and pumping stations
But the hydrologist is afraid that a lot of rubbish ends up in areas that are difficult to reach, so that it will eventually decompose into microplastics that can cause damage to biodiversity, the living system of plants and animals for decades or perhaps centuries.
In addition, damage can occur to ships and pumping stations. According to Van Emmerik, only 2 percent of the rubbish ends up in the sea; 98 percent ends up elsewhere. “Where exactly is not known, but because such large quantities are now involved, we are gaining new insight into where the plastic accumulates under normal circumstances.”
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