Thames21 and #OneLess fight the Thames plastic tide

The annual Big Bottle Count, London’s largest plastic waste monitoring event, saw more than 100 volunteers count and remove the plastic bottles from the Thames in the biggest action of the programme so far which took place in September.

As part of the ongoing investigation into the impact of single-use plastic bottles on the capital’s iconic river, 3,249 bottles were counted and removed at 18 sites along the Thames.

Organised by waterway charity Thames21 and the #OneLess the campaign aims to reduce single-use water bottle consumption in London.

Londoners have removed a total of 36,667 plastic bottles from the Thames in the past year alone, once the latest count is included.

In addition to the annual Big Count, volunteers count and remove bottles from key sites throughout the year as part of the ongoing plastic monitoring programme run by Thames21 and #OneLess.

Thames21 and #OneLess data suggests the summer heatwave had an impact on Londoner’s consumption of single-use plastic water bottles.

Water bottles are still one of the most common plastic types found in the river, but over the summer the proportion of water bottles exceeded fizzy drink bottles for the first time.

Since April 2016, when the joint Thames21 #OneLess monitoring programme began, the latest count brings 55,533 the number of single-use plastic bottles that have been removed from the river.

“In the wake of the BBC’s Blue Planet Londoners are engaging with the plastic issue like never before," said Alice Hall, one of the programme’s coordinators.”

“They’re concerned about plastic impacts on the Thames, its wildlife and the wider ocean. And we’re seeing Londoners’ massive clean-up efforts starting to have an impact. But people want the problem tackled at source. We need more refill points and fountains, alongside increased effective recycling.”

“Londoners have one of the highest rates of bottled water consumption in the country, getting get through two million single-use plastic water bottles a day,” added Fiona Llewellyn of the #OneLess campaign, at the Zoological Society of London.

“These bottles have the potential to make their way - via the Thames - into the ocean, contributing to the huge problem of ocean plastic we’re seeing across the globe. If we want to reduce London’s plastic footprint, we need the refill revolution to happen.”