MATERIAL SOLUTIONS
The latest research addressing the microplastics issue
Richard Neale of LTC Worldwide looks at the substantial research contribution, to the essential knowledge needed to tackle microplastics pollution, now being made by leading universities and commercial companies worldwide
he face and voice of the environmental campaigner David Attenborough have spurred awareness of the ‘plastic soup’ being created worldwide by the breakdown of plastic over the land surface and in every part of the Earth’s oceans. Despite the potential dangers of this being flagged up many years ago, national legislations on every continent have been culpably slow in prioritising technical R&D to identify a solution. The result is steadily increasing plastic microparticle pollution in what was once a clean international resource – the seas of the world. The substantial research contribution, to
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the essential knowledge needed, now being made by leading universities and commercial companies worldwide, will have implications for every user of textiles in every country, from textile rental and national healthcare right down to individual households using domestic washing machines.
Occurrence of microplastics Micro-plastic particles have now been found in ever increasing numbers over every land mass (including the summit of Everest) and down to the deepest ocean troughs. A recent survey of bottled drinking water (reference 1), using the
DANGEROUS BREAKDOWN: The breakdown of this bottle will contribute to the ‘plastic soup’
latest automatic counting techniques, found 260,000 nano-sized plastic particles per litre! A micrometre is one millionth of a metre; a nano-metre is 1000th of a micrometre, so it is not surprising that these particles are not removed by most commercial filters. The problem with crafting effective legislation for the purity of our drinking water and food with respect to microplastic contamination is that we do not yet know the safe range of size or number, or even which plastics might represent the worst hazard. One disturbing finding has been the
PLASTIC DEGRADATION: This typical plastic debris on the beach demonstrates the scale of continuing plastic degradation
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incidence of chemicals known to be harmful, in recycled plastic items (reference 2). Presumably some or all of these have been created during the recycling process, which opens a new raft of problems and research needs. This could mean that encouraging a greater uptake of recycling habits is not yet the benign solution it appears to be. Another disturbing incidence of micro- particle contamination has been found on food in plastic wrapping. The research was carried out on food in virgin wrapping, so the contamination found is unlikely to be from any recycling process.
Effect of microplastic particles on humans Recent assessments of microplastic particles in human tissue have found them in human lungs (reference 3) and in human brain tissue (reference 4). Work to determine what effect, if any, this has on the function of these organs appears so far to have been confined to experiments with rats. It would be both naïve and irresponsible to assume that the now widespread appearance of particles throughout the human body is non-malign, but LCN has not yet found any research being carried out that might indicate how severe any effects might be and what is the range of size, concentration and type of plastic particle that might be tolerated without harmful effect.
Removal of microplastic particles from the environment Before any remediation of the problem can be implemented, it is essential that contamination of the environment with micro-plastic particles be halted. The worldwide problem is massive, but the first step must surely be to halt the discharges that are making it worse by
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