Development a new index for littered waste assessment in different environments: A study on coastal and urban areas of northern Iran (Caspian Sea).

The coastal pollution has been evaluated using indexes like Clean Coast Index (CCI) in many countries. In this study, several coasts and urban areas in northern of Iran along the Caspian Sea, were assessed in terms of number and composition of litters. Furthermore, Clean Environment Index (CEI) was used for the first time to interpret the results. The results indicated that 60% of the coasts and 50% of the urban areas were in a dirty status and only 22% of the total surveyed areas were found to be in a clean status. The highest number of litters observed in the study areas was cigarette butt. Due to the impact of risk factor of different types of littered waste, it was obviously clear that CEI offers a more realistic and rigorous interpretation than CCI. Therefore, this new index can be considered to evaluate litters pollution in various areas. • Litters are most common pollution in beaches and urban environments. • Plastic group as most abundant litters consist 39.54% in total studied areas. • CCI showed that 40% of coasts are in clean, 40% in moderate, 20% in dirty status. • CEI showed that 60% of coasts and 50% of urban areas are in dirty status. • The number and composition of litters on the coasts varied with different land-uses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]