Cigarette butts and Marine litter
Issues and solutions to smoking related litter
Smoking related litter is among the top litter items found in Ireland and worldwide and Clean Coasts has worked with staff, experts and volunteer groups to develop a campaign to highlight and raise awareness and reduce the devastating impact that cigarette butts and smoking related litter has on our oceans around the world.
Did you know that cigarette butts are the most common form of marine litter? In fact, over 4.5 trillion cigarette butts are discarded every year, and many of them end up in our oceans, releasing toxic chemicals and harm marine animals.
Through surveys carried out by out by our Clean Coasts volunteers during Big Beach Clean we now know that cigarette litter, including cigarette butts, is one of the most prevalent cigarette items on our beaches.
We believe that everyone can make a difference by taking simple actions to reduce cigarette butt litter.
By working together, we can make a positive impact on our oceans and marine life across the globe. Join us in our mission to reduce cigarette butt litter on our Irish beaches.
Keep reading to find out more about the issue and impact of cigarette butts in Ireland and internationally.
Cigarette Butts: The Issue
Cigarette butts are the most discarded waste item worldwide, accounting for approximately 766.6 million kilograms of toxic trash each year. Equivalent in weight to 177,895 endangered African elephants (Source).
It is also the number one item of Irish litter with discarded cigarette butts accounting for almost half of discarded waste in Ireland, new research from National Litter Pollution Monitoring System has found (Source).
Research published by the Department of the Environment show that 48.4% of all littering in Ireland is made up of cigarette waste (Source) and each year, roughly 4.5 trillion cigarette filters pollute our oceans, rivers, city sidewalks, parks, soil and beaches and even inhibit the germination and growth of plants. (Source)
What can I do to solve the problem?
Dispose of your cigarette butts in the appropriate bin
If there is no suitable bin nearby, carry around a portable ashtray or make your own by cleaning out a mini glass jam jar (the kind you get in hotels!)
Refrain from smoking in areas where there is no suitable bin available.
Smoking Litter & The Big Beach Clean 2022
Cigarette butts are and have been the top litter item found during Clean Coasts Big Beach Clean event for the past number of years.
The Big Beach Clean is an annual call to action brought to you by Clean Coasts in association with Cully & Sully as part of the International Coastal Cleanup (ICC), operated internationally by Ocean Conservancy. This call to action invites communities and volunteers around the country to remove litter from around the Irish coast after the end of the bathing season.
In 2022, over 15% of the litter items recorded during the Big Beach Clean were smoking related litter making it the top item collected that year.
The same happened the previous year in 2021, where smoking litter items made up 22% of litter items recorded during the Big Beach Clean weekend.
Smoking litter, particularly cigarette butts, are prevalent litter types on the Irish Coastline that Clean Coasts groups work tirelessly to tackle the issue and keep their beaches clean, not only during The Big Beach Clean weekend, but all year round.
The more research that is conducted related to these issues, the more information we will have on the wider effects littered cigarette butts are having on biodiversity and ecosystem which in turn will bring us one step closer to finding a solution to the problem.
For more information on The Big Beach Clean head to https://cleancoasts.org/our-initiatives/big-beach-clean/
If you want to find out more about Cully & Sully head to https://cullyandsully.com/
Clean Coasts Groups and Anti-Smoking Litter Campaigns
A number of Clean Coasts groups have utilised their Clean Coasts Grant (more info on that here) as a way to spread awareness to the locals and visitors on their local beaches of the dangers that smoking litter causes.
Groups like Bettystown Tidy Towns, Keep Our Beaches Clean and Clontarf Tidy Towns shared their stories of why they were inspired to take action against smoking related litter and what they did to tackle the issue in their respective areas.
Click the button below to read our anti-smoking litter campaign blog post!
What are cigarette butts made of?
While most of a cigarette’s innards and paper wrapping disintegrate when smoked, not everything gets burned. Cigarette filters, also known as butts, littered each year – enough to reach Saturn and Back (Source). This is only an estimated third of which make it into the bin and are disposed of correctly (Source)
Often these cigarette filters are often assumed to be biodegradable, but this is actually a myth. Cigarette filters are made of a plastic called cellulose acetate. Cellulose-acetate-based cigarette filters do not biodegrade and can remain in the environment for very long periods of time in the form of microplastics. When ingested, the hazardous chemicals in microplastics cause long-term mortality in marine life, including birds, fish, mammals, plants and reptiles (Source).
These types of plastic filters are estimated to be the component in 90% of commercial cigarettes (Source). Plastic cigarette butts are one of the most common plastic litter item on beaches, making marine ecosystems more susceptible to microplastic leakages (Source).
The impacts of cigarette butts
Used cigarette butts are not biodegradable and may take over a decade to decompose and continue to be toxic during this time (Source).
When littered in an aquatic environment, due to their porous structure and consequent low density, filters can be transported over long distances until they become saturated with water and begin to sink (Source).
Littered cigarette butts are a major contributor of microplastic contamination with each cigarette filter contains approximately 15,000 microplastic fibers and these can be shed at a rate of around 100 microplastic fibres per day into water (Source).
Microfibres from cigarette butts are an important source of microplastics and might explain the high concentration of artificial polymers that have been found in the deep-sea sediments (Source).
Those microfibers from cigarette filters can have toxic effects on organisms (Source) with the cigarette buts amounting to an estimated 0.3 million tons of microfibers released per year. This is similar to estimated microfiber emissions from domestic laundry (0.28 million tons) (Source).
There is now ample evidence that microplastics pose a threat to ecosystems (Source) and according to research, just one cigarette butt per litre of water leaches enough toxins to kill half the freshwater or saltwater fish exposed to it (Source).
Over 35 studies have examined the toxicity of cigarette butts, but many organisms and habitats have not been tested. Two-thirds of studies are on aquatic organisms, and lethal effects were common. Research on the impacts on terrestrial life is lagging behind. Cigarette butts can affect the growth, behaviour, and reproductive output of individual organisms in all three habitats, but research on wider effects on biodiversity and ecosystem functioning is lacking (Source).
Vaping litter
Vapes are made up of a number of materials, including plastic, rubber, and metal (Source). This means that they can’t break down naturally and persist in our environments for a significant period of time. Cigarette-related items, including vapes make up almost half of all litter pollution in Ireland (Source).
1.3 million single-use vapes are thrown away every week. As each vape contains a battery, this means that 10 tonnes of lithium are discarded annually, the equivalent of the batteries that can be found in 1,200 electric vehicles (Source)
Vape and e-cigarette batteries need to be recycled properly and should not be placed in a household waste bin. You can dispose of these devices for free in any WEEE Ireland Blue Battery Box which can be found in most retailers or at your local civic amenity site (Source).
Find out more information by heading to https://www.weeeireland.ie/vape-e-cigarette-device-recycling/
Before disposing of your cigarette butts make sure that you:
Never toss hot cigarette butts or ashes in the bin.
Smokers should fully extinguish their cigarettes in an ashtray or soak them in water.
Do not throw lit cigarettes out of moving vehicles or directly on the ground, not only does this action increase the potential for a fire, but it is considered littering and can result in a fine.