This study identifies and quantifies floating macro litter and macro plastic from Deli River Medan during pandemic Covid-19. Macro litter transport consists of floating items at surface, suspended in water column and transport over on riverbed. Litter was collected from 5 location along 11.6 km using static trawls with a height of 150 cm and width of 300 cm with a square mesh size of 0.5 cm. Sampling was done in July, and during selection, 40 cm of net’s height was constantly submerged for one hour. This study found that macro litter was 19.26 kg/h with 65.2% as anthropogenic waste, 34.3% as macro plastic, 0.3% as metal, and 0.15% as medical waste. The composition of macro plastic has various variants, namely food containers, plastic bags, food packaging, sanitary packaging, and mineral water packaging with percentages of 10.21%, 67.89%, 8.35%, 4.36%, and 9.18%. The macro plastic abundance was obtained at 2,476 x 10-4 kg/m3. This study showed a significant increase in plastic consumption during the pandemic, especially plastic bags because it is dominated in all locations.
Microplastic is new pollution and made from a synthetic polymer. The Deli River is one of the main rivers in Medan city that flow on urban and suburban areas. This study has aims to identify the characteristics (shape and type), the quantity, and the microplastic correlation with the flow velocity. Sample collected at eight locations based on SNI 03-70160-2004 and preparation in the laboratory with organic digestion and density separation. The microplastic characterized identified with FTIR and microscopy, the quantity identified with microscopy. Analyze the relation tested by Kolmogorov-Smirnov Test and significance tested by Pearson Correlation at a 95% confidence level. The result showed that Deli River contains polyethylene, Polypropylene, and Polystyrene with film and fragment shape dominated. The average microplastic quantity on Deli River Water is 102 particles L-1. The amount of microplastic has a positive correlation with the flow velocity. Most of the microplastic on Deli River Water in Medan came from secondary microplastic.
Microplastic in freshwater are an emerging global issue. Microplastic can be ingested by plankton and accumulated in aquatic food web. This study describes the characteristic of microplastic and the abundance of microplastic on water and sediments. The Babura River in Medan was used as a case study. The water dan sediments were collected at 3 location on July 2020 and conducted preparation on laboratory. The characterized of microplastic were using microscopy for the shape and FTIR for the type. The abundance were identify with microscopy. The characterize of collected water and sediments indicated that it contains polypropylene, polystyrene and polyethylene with fragment, film and fibre dominated for the shapes. The abundance of microplastic are from 15 particles/100g to 39 particles/100g on sediments and 68 particles/L to 132 particles/L on water. Similar shape were observed at all location, suggesting that anthropogenic activities in Babura river contributed for microplastic pollution.
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