Abstract
Traditional stereomicroscopy (SM) is limited for the identification of microplastics of less than 500 µm in wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). Accordingly, novel methods for the accurate quantification of these microplastics are needed. In this study, we investigated the polymer type, morphology, size distribution, and abundance of microplastics in each unit of three selected WWTPs by SM and a fluorescence-based protocol (FR) combined with FTIR. Using the FR method, most microplastics detected in the three WWTPs were 50–200 µm in size. Polyethylene, polypropylene, and polyamide were the main polymer types, and the distributions of fibers, films, and debris were determined. Despite highly similar microplastic removal rates (78.6‒95.2% (SM) and 77.4‒94.2% (FR)) in the WWTPs by the two methods, the microplastic abundances obtained by FR (405‒6987 items/L) were approximately 2 orders of magnitude higher than the corresponding results by SM (1‒21 items/L). In addition, a considerable number of small-sized microplastics (< 500 µm) were detected in the effluents (405‒947 items/L) using FR. These results clearly reveal that microplastics in WWTPs have been seriously underestimated in most previous studies based on SM. Further research should focus on the environmental risks of small-sized microplastics from WWTPs.
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This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 51638006 and 51868011), the Department of Science and Technology of Guangxi (Grant No. 2018GXNSFGA281001), and the Special Fund for Guangxi Distinguished Experts.
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Jia-jing Pan: investigation and writing of original draft. Hong-tao Liu: Conceptualization and writing which included review and editing. Fei-yang Xia: Investigation and formal analysis. Jun Zhang: Conceptualization, writing which included review and editing, and supervision. Dun-qiu Wang: writing, which included review, and resources.
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Pan, J., Liu, H., Xia, F. et al. Occurrence and fate of microplastics from wastewater treatment plants assessed by a fluorescence-based protocol. Environ Sci Pollut Res 30, 28690–28703 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-24196-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-24196-x