Walk along British Columbia’s shorelines and you quickly notice the signs of human-made activities and marine industry: boats anchored and hauled out for repair in marinas, abandoned vessels, the smell of fresh paint, workers sanding hulls and stacks of fibreglass materials waiting to be used.

Most people would not see these activities as a source of pollution. Yet our research suggests they are releasing tiny fibreglass particles into coastal environments.

We found that fibreglass particles are accumulating in coastal sediments in British Columbia, particularly near marinas and boat maintenance sites. These particles are largely overlooked in monitoring programs, but they may represent an emerging form of pollution with implications for coastal ecosystems and food webs.

We first became interested in this issue while studying microplastics in the Cowichan-Koksilah Estuary on Vancouver Island’s east coast. These synthetic particles are prevalent in the estuary, raising concerns for marine fauna and traditional seafoods.

Our conversations with Bernhard Juurlink, Bill Heath and Goetz Schuerholz of the Cowichan Estuary Restoration and Conservation Association (CERCA) led to a new question: what about fibreglass?

In our new study, we found fibreglass particles in more than 96 per cent of sediment samples collected across the Cowichan-Koksilah Estuary.........

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