Microplastic pollution and quantitative source apportionment in the Jiangsu coastal area, China

Teng Wang; Baojie Li; Wenwen Yu; Xinqing Zou

doi:10.1016/j.marpolbul.2021.112237

Microplastic pollution and quantitative source apportionment in the Jiangsu coastal area, China

Mar Pollut Bull. 2021 May:166:112237. doi: 10.1016/j.marpolbul.2021.112237. Epub 2021 Mar 9.

Authors

Teng Wang¹, Baojie Li², Wenwen Yu³, Xinqing Zou⁴

Affiliations

¹ Key Laboratory of Marine Hazards Forecasting, Ministry of Natural Resources, Hohai University, Nanjing 210098, China; College of Oceanography, Hohai University, Nanjing 210098, China.
² Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Atmospheric Environment Monitoring and Pollution Control, Collaborative Innovation Center of Atmospheric Environment and Equipment Technology, School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology, Nanjing 210044, China. Electronic address: baojieli@nuist.edu.cn.
³ Marine Fisheries Research Institute of Jiangsu Province, Nantong 226007, China.
⁴ Ministry of Education Key Laboratory for Coastal and Island Development, School of Geography and Ocean Science, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210023, China. Electronic address: zouxq@nju.edu.cn.

PMID: 33711604
DOI: 10.1016/j.marpolbul.2021.112237

Abstract

We investigated the pollution characteristics, the spatial distributions of microplastics, and the source compositions in the Jiangsu Coastal Area, China. The average abundance of microplastics in the surface water and sediment were 0.0998 ± 0.0720 items/m³ (using a trawl with 333-μm mesh)and 0.1858 ± 0.0927items/g, respectively. The concentration of microplastics showed a distribution trend of high near shore and low far shore in the east-west direction, and were the highest in the southernmost part. According to microplastics found in the surface water, the results of a quantitative source apportionment indicate that the most common source in the northernmost and southernmost regions were clothing fibers, accounting for 38.40% and 40.44% of the total source, respectively. While the major source type in the middle region was the decomposition of hard, large plastic waste. Finally, we suggested some control measures for the main types of microplastics observed in the different regions.

Keywords: Jiangsu coastal area; Microplastic; Source apportionment; Spatial distribution.

MeSH terms

China
Environmental Monitoring
Microplastics*
Plastics
Water Pollutants, Chemical* / analysis

Substances

Microplastics
Plastics
Water Pollutants, Chemical