Volunteers with Ocean Conservancy’s International Coastal Cleanup (ICC) picked up 1,338,712 plastic beverage bottles and 885,854 caps from beaches and waterways worldwide in 2025. That makes them the first and third most commonly found items of litter across every cleanup site the organization tracked. The numbers, released by Ocean Conservancy this week from its 2025 ICC — the largest single-day beach cleanup in the world — reveal two things. First, is that surfers and beachgoers who feel like they’re picking up the same type of trash, time after time, are not imagining it. Second, that the problem has documented solutions that have yet to be implemented. It’s almost feels like we are just sweeping it under the proverbial rug. Needless to say, the ocean is not a rug — it is what connects us all. Furthermore, there really is no away , the plastic trash that we make is here to stay. A crab on a littered water bottle in Thailand.…