Each year, millions of people visit U.S. national parks and federal lands to experience their natural beauty, but many of those same landscapes are facing an increasingly visible problem — plastic waste. The Plastic-Free Parks TrashBlitz, now in its fourth year, invites the public to help combat that issue through community science.
Becky Schnekser, communications manager at Adventure Scientists, explains how volunteers can participate by visiting a park or public land, collecting litter and submitting their findings through the TrashBlitz app. The data, gathered in collaboration with the nonprofit 5 Gyres, helps identify the most common materials, items and brands found across public lands, guiding evidence-based recommendations to reduce plastic pollution.
Schnekser shares how this nationwide initiative turns everyday visitors into environmental data collectors and how small individual actions, when aggregated, can lead to powerful change for our planet’s most beloved places.
