Metals in boat paint fragments from slipways, repair facilities and abandoned vessels: An evaluation using field portable XRF

Turner, Andrew; Comber, Sean; Gkiokas, Dimitrios; Solman, Kevin R.

doi:10.1016/j.talanta.2014.08.012

Cited by 34 publications

(16 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…The metal measurements on boat hulls (Table 2) exceeded the values found in paint flakes by Rees et al (2014) by a factor of between 2.5 and 90 for copper and 1.7 and 383 for zinc (based on median values). The results of our study also exceeded those by others (Turner et al 2015) for Cu and Zn, whereas Sn concentrations were lower by a factor of 8.5. The high levels of metals detected in the current study may represent both an environmental risk as well as a health hazard for people performing the paint scraping (Links et al 2007).…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 74%

Biofouling of leisure boats as a source of metal pollution

Bighiu

Eriksson-Wiklund

Eklund

2016

Environ Sci Pollut Res

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The release of harmful metals from antifouling paints to water bodies is a well-known problem. In this study, we measured both the amount of biofouling growth on leisure boats during one season as well as the concentration of metals accumulated by the biofouling matrix. Furthermore, the efficiency of antifouling paints and mechanical boat cleaning as well as the effect of hull colour on biofouling were evaluated. Unlike paint residues, biofouling waste has never been regarded as a source of metal contamination and has previously been neglected in the scientific literature. Our results revealed that the biofouling waste contained very high concentrations of metals, up to 28,000 mg copper/kg dw and 171,000 mg zinc/kg dw, which exceeds the guidance values for least sensitive land use in Sweden by factors of 140 and 340, respectively. This observation is important because the contaminated biofouling waste is commonly disposed of in boatyard soils at the end of each season, thus increasing the levels of metal pollution. Moreover, there was no significant difference in the amount of biofouling if the boats were coated with copper or zinc containing paints or no paint at all, indicating that biocide paints might not be necessary in lowsalinity areas such as the Stockholm archipelago. For boats that were not painted at all during the season, those washed on boat washers (mechanically) had on average half of the amount of biofouling compared to boats that were not cleaned mechanically. The results of the study indicate the importance of proper management of biofouling waste as well as the use of more environmentally friendly removal methods for biofouling such as boat washers.

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Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 74%

Biofouling of leisure boats as a source of metal pollution

Bighiu

Eriksson-Wiklund

Eklund

2016

Environ Sci Pollut Res

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“…Samples encompassed a variety of plastic fragments, expanded polymers (including polyurethane and polystyrene), ropes and a piece of cork but excluded painted surfaces. (Note that while paints could not be completely isolated from their substrates, a comparison of discrete paint fragment analysis by FP-XRF and ICP given elsewhere indicates good agreement between the two approaches [16].) The results of the present study revealed no false negatives among the samples and for all elements considered; that is, lack of detection by the XRF was not accompanied by a measurement by ICP that exceeded the corresponding LOD of the XRF.…”

Section: Independent Analysis Of Marine Litter By Icp Following Acid supporting

confidence: 71%

“…Note also that, in the case of As, overlap of its K α fluorescence peak with the L α peak of Pb and the relatively low intensity of the As-K β line means that As concentrations cannot be effectively calculated for samples with Pb:As ratios in excess of about 10 [14]. Because false positives may often be returned for the metalloid by FP-XRF in the presence of Pb [16], As concentrations given in Table 4 are restricted to those returned where Pb was not detectable.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Analysis of the elemental composition of marine litter by field-portable-XRF

Turner

Solman

2016

Talanta

Self Cite

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Marine litter represents a pervasive environmental problem that poses direct threats to wildlife and habitats. Indirectly, litter can also act as a vehicle for the exposure and bioaccumulation of chemicals that are associated with manufactured or processed solids. In this study, we describe the use of a Niton field-portable-x-ray fluorescence (FP-XRF) spectrometer to determine the content of 17 elements in beached plastics, foams, ropes and painted items. The instrument was used in a 'plastics' mode configured for complex, low density materials, and employed a thickness correction algorithm to account for varying sample depth. Accuracy was evaluated by analysing two reference polyethylene discs and was better than 15% for all elements that had been artificially impregnated into the polymer. Regarding the litter samples, limits of detection for a 120s counting time varied between the different material categories and among the elements but were generally lowest for plastics and painted items with median concentrations of less than 10μgg(-1) for As, Bi, Br, Cr, Hg, Ni, Pb, Se and Zn. Concentrations returned by the XRF were highly sensitive to the thickness correction applied for certain elements (Ba, Cl, Cr, Cu, Fe, Sb, Ti, Zn) in all matrices tested, indicating that accurate measurement and application of the correct thickness is critical for acquiring reliable results. An independent measure of the elemental content of selected samples by ICP spectrometry following acid digestion returned concentrations that were significantly correlated with those returned by the XRF, and with an overall slope of [XRF]/[ICP]=0.85. Within the FP-XRF operating conditions, Cl, Cr, Fe, Ti and Zn were detected in more than 50% and Hg and Se in less than 1% of the 376 litter samples analysed. Significant from an environmental perspective were concentrations of the hazardous elements, Cd, Br and Pb, that exceeded several thousand μgg(-1) in many cases.

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“…Thus, leaching of OT compounds from the hull to the water is presumed to be negligible. The risk for environmental impacts arises during maintenance work such as scraping, blasting and high pressure hosing activities Turner et al, 2015;Turner, 2010;.…”

Section: Tinmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Approximately 17.5% of the freshwater boats had copper concentrations >4000 mg/cm 2 , which corresponds to four layers of Cruiser One or one layer of Mille Xtra. Because the use of biocides is restricted in antifouling paints applied on boats moored in freshwater, copper and zinc may instead leach both into the water and on land during maintenance work Turner et al, 2015).…”

Section: Copper and Zincmentioning

confidence: 99%

XRF measurements of tin, copper and zinc in antifouling paints coated on leisure boats

Ytreberg

Bighiu

Lundgren

et al. 2016

Environmental Pollution

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Tributyltin (TBT) and other organotin compounds have been restricted for use on leisure boats since 1989 in the EU. Nonetheless, release of TBT is observed from leisure boats during hull maintenance work, such as pressure hosing. In this work, we used a handheld X-ray Fluorescence analyser (XRF) calibrated for antifouling paint matrixes to measure tin, copper and zinc in antifouling paints coated on leisure boats in Sweden. Our results show that over 10% of the leisure boats (n = 686) contain >400 μg/cm(2) of tin in their antifouling coatings. For comparison, one layer (40 μm dry film) of a TBT-paint equals ≈ 800 μg Sn/cm(2). To our knowledge, tin has never been used in other forms than organotin (OT) in antifouling paints. Thus, even though the XRF analysis does not provide any information on the speciation of tin, the high concentrations indicate that these leisure boats still have OT coatings present on their hull. On several leisure boats we performed additional XRF measurements by progressively scraping off the top coatings and analysing each underlying layer. The XRF data show that when tin is detected, it is most likely present in coatings close to the hull with several layers of other coatings on top. Thus, leaching of OT compounds from the hull into the water is presumed to be negligible. The risk for environmental impacts arises during maintenance work such as scraping, blasting and high pressure hosing activities. The data also show that many boat owners apply excessive paint layers when following paint manufacturers recommendations. Moreover, high loads of copper were detected even on boats sailing in freshwater, despite the more than 20 year old ban, which poses an environmental risk that has not been addressed until now.

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Metals in boat paint fragments from slipways, repair facilities and abandoned vessels: An evaluation using field portable XRF

Cited by 34 publications

References 23 publications

Biofouling of leisure boats as a source of metal pollution

Biofouling of leisure boats as a source of metal pollution

Analysis of the elemental composition of marine litter by field-portable-XRF

XRF measurements of tin, copper and zinc in antifouling paints coated on leisure boats

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