Coca-Cola, McDonald’s and PepsiCo named UK’s biggest packaging polluters

Surfers Against Sewage looked at more than 30,700 polluting items collected along coastlines, canal paths, bridleways and city streets over a 12-month period. Photograph: Ian Lean/SAS/PA

Coca-Cola, McDonald’s and PepsiCo have been named as the biggest packaging polluters in the UK, according to an annual audit.

The campaign group Surfers Against Sewage examined more than 30,700 individual polluting items collected by 4,000 citizen scientists alongside coastlines, canal paths, bridleways and city streets over a 12-month period up to 5 June 2023.