According to a US study, the United States of America is the biggest producer of plastic waste worldwide. In 2016, some 42 million tons of plastic waste was generated there – more than twice as much as was produced by China and more than all the countries of the European Union together, write the authors of an expert report. The report from the non-profit National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine was submitted to the US government, and contains a number of recommendations. Above all the production of new plastics should, in the opinion of the academies, be reduced.

In early summer 2021, two women from Flensburg in northern Germany went fishing for microplastic in the North Sea and Baltic Sea. Nine sailing enthusiasts and a number of other volunteers assisted them in the so-called Citizen Science Project. The results will now be made available to science.

After a good three and a half years of research, the joint project "TextileMission", which was funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), has been concluded and the results have been published in a detailed final report. The report says that, in Germany, around ten tonnes of microplastic are released every year through the wearing and washing of sportswear such as fleece jackets and sports shirts and vests. 93 to 97 percent of the particles smaller than 5 millimetres and larger than 5 micrometres are retained in the treatment plants which means that between 100 kilogramme and 1.3 tonnes are released into the environment every year.

According to the intermediate result of an ongoing study on the documentation, evaluation and prevention of microplastic in composts and digestate from biowaste recycling units and their discharge into agricultural soil (MiKoBo), just under 450 tonnes of microplastics are discharged annually throughout Germany via composts and liquid digestate products. Of this, plastic sheet and film account for 146 tonnes and rigid plastics for 302 tonnes. The research project is funded by the German State of Baden-Württemberg and also involves the universities of Stuttgart, Hohenheim and Bayreuth as well as the Fraunhofer Institute for Chemical Technology, ICT.