Microplastic pollution in Sydney's waterways has tripled over the past three years, making the Australian city a hot spot for marine plastic contamination, a report revealed Wednesday.

The report by the non-governmental Australian Microplastic Assessment Project, which analyzed seven years of shoreline surveys within the state of New South Wales, found an average of 1,004 microplastic pieces per square meter in samples from the state capital, Sydney, between 2022 and 2025, up from 306 during the monitoring period from 2018 to 2021.

Microplastics are plastic particles smaller than 5 millimeters, resulting from the breakdown of larger debris and industrial products such as clothing, tires, and more. These items permeate modern life and spread via stormwater, air, wastewater, and rivers into ecosystems, the report said.

Polystyrene foam and "hard" plastic fragments made up between 50 and 90 percent of debris, largely traced to mismanaged waste from construction sites, packaging and floating structures, according to the report.

The New South Wales government said its Plastics Plan 2.0 is phasing out items such as bread tags, fruit stickers, and bags with handles, and aims to require new washing machines to include microfiber filters by 2028, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported.