Fate of microplastics in wastewater treatment plants and their environmental dispersion with effluent and sludge

Edo, Carlos; González-Pleiter, Miguel; Leganés, Francisco; Fernández-Piñas, Francisca; Rosal, Roberto

doi:10.1016/j.envpol.2019.113837

Cited by 414 publications

(215 citation statements)

References 50 publications

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“…Regarding effluent characteristics, Freeman et al [93] reported how polyester microfibers and polyethylene microparticles are the most found in WWTPs effluents, whereas according to Sun et al [67] MPs of the smallest size fractions are most common. For some authors, the lowest size classes have indeed the higher frequency [89,91,92]; however, other authors do not confirm this finding [79].…”

Section: Fate Of Mps In Wwtpsmentioning

confidence: 89%

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Presence and fate of microplastics in the water sources: focus on the role of wastewater and drinking water treatment plants

Barchiesi

Chiavola

Marcantonio

et al. 2021

Journal of Water Process Engineering

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Microplastics are nowadays considered as ubiquitous pollutants since have been found widespread in all environmental compartments, particularly in the water sources. In the urban water cycle, the drinking water treatment plants and the wastewater treatment plants are the first and last barriers to microplastics pollution, respectively. The present work aims at presenting the information available on microplastic presence in the urban water cycle, reporting and linking what is known at the different stages. Focus is on the water sources and on the role of the water treatment plants as source and control of microplastics pollution. Aspects evaluated are microplastics abundance, characterization in terms of morphology, size and polymer composition, spatial and temporal variations, factors influencing their distribution and abundance, effects of treatments on their removal. Up to now there is no common framework for microplastics collection, sample pre-treatment, identification, quantification and classification. Data comparison is hindered due to the various analytical protocols implemented; hence the conclusions driven are mostly indicative or of very local significance. The available information is not evenly distributed among the urban water cycle components. For the establishment of proper microplastics pollution control strategies, the relative role of wastewater and drinking water treatment plants needs to be better deepened in terms of both quantity and quality effects. All these aspects are afforded in the present review which is based on the more recent data published by the specialized literature.

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Section: Fate Of Mps In Wwtpsmentioning

confidence: 89%

“…The authors underlined anyway the need of further research on the topic [69]. In some studies, MPs overall removal obtained by secondary treatments was higher than 90 % [82,85,91,92].…”

Section: Fate Of Mps In Wwtpsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Presence and fate of microplastics in the water sources: focus on the role of wastewater and drinking water treatment plants

Barchiesi

Chiavola

Marcantonio

et al. 2021

Journal of Water Process Engineering

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“…The implementation of an H 2 O 2 (30%) pre‐digestion step before extraction resulted in more efficient removal of microplastics from soil and wastewater sludge when compared to no pre‐digestion step (Li, Wu, et al, 2019). In addition to these studies, multiple reviews quantifying microplastics at various stages of treatment and in the environment were conducted (Edo, Gonzalez‐Pleiter, Leganes, Fernandez‐Pinas, & Rosal, 2020; Gatidou, Arvaniti, & Stasinakis, 2019; Kazour et al, 2019; Magni et al, 2019; Rhodes, 2019; Sun, Dai, Wang, van Loosdrecht, & Ni, 2019; Wang, Liu, et al, 2019).…”

Section: Analysis and Quantification Of Characteristicsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Residuals, sludge, and biosolids: Advancements in the field

Brisolara

Gentile

Puszykowski

et al. 2020

Water Environment Research

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Advancements in the field of residuals, sludge, and biosolids have been made in 2019. This review outlines the major contributions of researchers that have been published in peer-reviewed journals and conference proceedings throughout 2019 and includes brief summaries from over 125 articles. The review is organized in sections including life cycle and risk assessments; characteristics, quality, and measurement including micropollutants, nanoparticles, pathogens, and metals; sludge treatment technologies including dewatering, digestion, composting, and wetlands; disposal and reuse including adsorbents, land application and agricultural uses, nutrient recovery, and innovative uses; odor and air emissions; and energy issues.

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“…Microplastics in WWTPs have been recognized only by visual identification [3], [23], or with the aid of spectrometric methods; i.e., Raman [20] or µ-Raman [24] spectroscopy, or Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) [19] or µ-FTIR [25], analysing all isolated microparticles [19] or just a part of them [26]. In our study, we present the removal rates of microplastics and treatment efficiencies of two different wastewater treatment technologies; i.e.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Abatement of Microplastics From Municipal Effluents by Two Different Wastewater Treatment Technologies

Bayo

López-Castellanos

Olmos

2020

WIT Transactions on Ecology and the Environment

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This paper discusses the role of two different wastewater treatment technologies in the removal efficiency of microplastics from the final effluent of an urban wastewater treatment plant; i.e., a membrane bioreactor as an advanced wastewater treatment technology and rapid sand filtration as a tertiary treatment after an activated sludge process. Fourteen different polymer types were identified in all wastewater samples, mainly represented by low-density polyethylene (71.89%), high-density polyethylene (5.44%), acrylate (5.24%), polypropylene (5.22%), polystyrene (4.24%), and nylon (2.56%). The main forms isolated were fibres (61.2%), followed by films (31.5%), fragments (6.7%), and beads (0.6%). The main size interval corresponded to 1 and 2 mm, accounting for 28.2%, 37.3%, and 36.8% for the influent, membrane bioreactor, and rapid sand filtration, respectively. A total of 480 microplastic particles were isolated in all wastewater samples, with an average concentration of 2.16 ± 0.42 items l-1 , and removal rate percentages of 79.01% for the membrane bioreactor and 75.49% for rapid sand filtration. Both technologies proved to be more efficient removing particulate microplastics (98.83% and 95.53%, respectively) than fibres (57.61% and 53.83%, respectively), showing a clear escape into the aquatic environment for fibres. The average microplastic size displayed a statistically significant increase from the influent of the sewage treatment plant (1.05 ± 0.05 mm), to rapid sand filtration effluent (1.15 ± 0.08 mm) and membrane bioreactor (1.39 ± 0.15 mm) (F-test = 4.014, p = 0.019) indicating the fibre selection made by advanced treatment technologies previously discussed.

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Fate of microplastics in wastewater treatment plants and their environmental dispersion with effluent and sludge

Cited by 414 publications

References 50 publications

Presence and fate of microplastics in the water sources: focus on the role of wastewater and drinking water treatment plants

Presence and fate of microplastics in the water sources: focus on the role of wastewater and drinking water treatment plants

Residuals, sludge, and biosolids: Advancements in the field

Abatement of Microplastics From Municipal Effluents by Two Different Wastewater Treatment Technologies

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