| Summary: | Riverine systems act as converging pathways for discarded litter within drainage basins, becoming key elements in gauging the transfer of mismanaged waste into the ocean. However, riverine litter data are scarce and biased towards microplastics, generally lacking information on larger items. Based on the first ever database of riverine floating macro-litter across Europe, we estimate that between 107 and 498 million litter items are released annually from Europe to the ocean. The plastic fraction represents 82% of observed litter, such as fragments and single-use items, including bottles, cover/packaging and bags. Despite the importance of large rivers, a major portion of the total litter loading is routed through small-sized drainage basins (< 100 km2), demonstrating the relevance of small rivers, streams and coastal runoff. Moreover, the litter contribution from developed European countries to the ocean suggests that reducing plastic pollution cannot only depend on waste management improvement but necessarily on changing consumption and behaviour habits. Modelled Floating Macro-litter Loading (items y-1) from Europe to the ocean. The shapefile contains litter loading output for 32,651 drainage basins. Based on the based on catchment data from the CCM River and Catchment Database including sea outlets (n= 17,772) extracted from the EU-Hydro River Network database and centroids of polygons (n= 14879) for drainage basins with undefined sea outlet nodes (EPSG: 4326, WGS 84). The following data fields are included in the attribute table: BasinSize_Total : drainage basin total area (square kilometres). BasinSize_200kmBuffer : drainage basin area (square kilometres) overlapping the 200km buffer from the river outlet. Population_200kmBuffer : number of inhabitants in the drainage basin area overlapping the 200km buffer from the river outlet. MW_200kmBuffer : mismanaged waste production (tonnes per year) in the drainage basin area overlapping the 200km buffer from the river outlet. OutletCountry : country receiving the litter loading. OutletRegionalSea : Regional Sea receiving the litter. BalticSea, BlackSea, MedSea (Mediterranean Sea) and NEA (North-East Atlantic Ocean region). LitterMidEstimate : Modelled mid estimate of Floating Macro-litter Loading in items per year.
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