Backscatter Analysis of Marine Plastic Litter Using A C- and X-Band Ground Radar

The remote sensing of marine plastics is a relatively new field and research into radars capabilities for monitoring / detection is mostly limited. Here, we utilize the use of a C- and X-band ground radar to understand the capabilities for monitoring marine plastic pollution. Results show that backscattering differences can be found between reference acquisitions of clean water and test water filled with plastics, in both C- and X-band frequencies. With X-band detecting significant differences in backscattering in 48/68 test cases, and C-band detecting differences in 20/67 test cases.