Avery Dougherty always knew she wanted to research oceanography, but she has a deep love of the mountains, too. Dougherty grew up skiing in Park City and hasn’t missed a winter season here since she was 4 years old. Through her latest research project, she’s able to combine her love of the ocean with her love of the mountains.
Dougherty, a staff research associate at the UC San Diego Scripps Institution of Oceanography, published a study with research scientist Dr. Dimitri Deheyn studying microplastics in the snow. The samples for the experiment were collected at Dougherty’s home resort, Park City Mountain.
Deheyn and Dougherty primarily study microplastics in marine biology. They’re finding that microplastics are everywhere, including in places thought of as untouched, like fresh snow. Their research has led them to the Wasatch Back mountains in search of pristine snow.
Microplastic research is often related to marine environments, but Deheyn wanted the study to focus on the atmosphere and water cycle as a bigger concept.
“The ocean is the consequence of what comes upstream,” Deheyn said.
Plastics that start out in the ocean deteriorate to microscopic sizes and are carried into the atmosphere by ocean winds. They are eventually dispersed across the planet as they’re transported by wind currents.
Because of the shape of each microplastic particle, they attach to water molecules and fall to the Earth’s surface when it snows.
“We studied the biology of these small microplastics,” Deheyn said. “How are they created, how do they disperse, where do they end up, which kind of food webs do they enter?”
It can be challenging to sample the particles while they’re in the atmosphere. Instead, Deheyn’s group studied the microparticles in the atmosphere by catching them the moment it snowed. The study sampled fresh snow from remote areas of the mountain, away from trees, lifts and ski or snowboard activity.
“The idea we had was if we analyze fresh snow, we would capture small microparticles that would be a reflection of what was in the air, rather than what comes from the skiers or snowboarders,” Deheyn said.
That’s where Dougherty became involved. She has never missed a winter skiing trip to Park City with her family, so the resort was an easy choice to collect snow samples.
Dougherty visited each winter over four years to collect snow samples from various locations around the Canyons Village area of the resort and the city.
“Getting to do research (at Park City) is really surreal for me,” Dougherty said. “I feel like it’s kind of full circle to be able to go skiing and do work. It is really fun.”
Dougherty said her dad knows the resort “like the back of his hand,” so he had valuable input when they were choosing different locations to study. She collected samples off of the NinetyNine 90, Peak 5 and Tombstone runs, as well as the top and bottom of Main Street.
Dougherty and her dad would watch Doppler radar and look forward to big storms as sample collection days.
“Overall it was an amazing experience, and I hope that we can do more work within the resort and outside the resort,” Dougherty said. “The skiing, obviously, was awesome when we got a lot of snow.”
This particular study used “epifluorescence” technology, which shows how microparticles can be found in the environment by different fluorescent colors.
The plastic particles can be made of different materials and range in size from 1 micron — the size of one one-thousandth of a millimeter — to 5 millimeters. Deheyn and Dougherty were interested in small microplastics, between one and 100 microns.
The results from the Main Street samples weren’t surprising, Dougherty said.
More microparticles were found there than on the mountain, with most found in the snow at the bottom of Main Street. Those samples had higher levels of textiles and rubber from car tires. These particles are classified as microfibers, a subset of microplastics, and come directly from present-day human impact.
Everyone involved with the research was surprised by the results from NinetyNine 90, though.
Out of all the resort’s sample sites, NinetyNine 90 is the highest and most remote. Dougherty even took the samples from the backcountry areas that aren’t frequently skied to find the cleanest snow possible.
Still, the study confirmed the location had the highest level of microplastics. They also determined microplastics in those areas were in the environment much longer than the microfibers on Main Street. Most of the particles come from “legacy plastics,” which include some of the first plastic products invented in the ’50s and ’60s.
Deheyn said the results aren’t a consequence of anything specific happening in the Park City area. Instead, it’s evidence of how long plastics stay in the global environment and linger in the air.
“I really don’t want people to … think skiers are ruining Park City and the snow,” Dougherty said. “I want people to understand that microplastic pollution is an invisible global problem that’s reaching places we traditionally think are pristine, including our mountains and our snow.”
The results match other studies showing higher levels of microplastics in snow at remote locations, such as high in the mountains of Alaska and the Himalayas and even the North and South Poles. Wind and elevation are the most significant factors affecting how microplastics appear in snow samples.
There isn’t much that can be done about microplastics already in the environment. What people can do, Deheyn and Dougherty emphasized, is change their habits now.
“When I’m talking to people, I don’t want them to feel hopeless and that what they’re doing isn’t working. It definitely is helping,” Dougherty said.
The pair said they didn’t want the results of this study to make people afraid or discouraged. Instead, they hope this inspires action at a community and individual level.
“It’s only by being a unified society that we can actually influence the policymakers in the industries,” Deheyn said. “The more you talk about it, the more you make people realize that they are part of the global system.”
As far as direct impact, Deheyn said the biggest thing a person can do is be mindful of the clothing and textiles they use.
Polyester is one of the most common microplastics they found in the analyses. As people wear polyester, the fibers shed and enter the environment. Because most snow gear is made of polyester, this particular environmental impact can be hard to avoid, but Dougherty said she tries to find alternatives when possible, opting for wool or cotton base layers, for example, and when necessary, aiming for polyester products that will last longer and not break down as quickly.
“I want us to have hope that people are working on finding a solution,” Dougherty said. “My main goal is just to help preserve our planet. That’s all.”