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Study of the temporal variation of microplastics in the secondary treatment exit of the WWTP of Chania

Loukas Ilias

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Summary

The production of plastic products revolutionized industry in the second half of the twentieth century. Their easy molding into any shape, sterility, disposability and low cost compared to other materials (i.e., steel, glass), made them necessary, resulting in their mass production. This rapid increase worldwide is now a major problem for the environment and humans due to their misuse and disposal.Microplastics (MPs) are plastic particles smaller than five millimeters in size and are divided into two main groups: primary and secondary. Wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) are an important pathway for microplastics into the environment as wastewater is discharged into the environment after a series of chemical and physical processes. However, the high concentration of microplastics in wastewater, which in turn ends up in the receiving waters despite the high removal rate during the treatment process in biological treatment plants, was not foreseen.In this thesis, MPs were detected and recorded from the wastewater of the WWTP of Chania, more specifically from the effluent of the secondary sedimentation tank (S. S. T.) in order to study the temporal variation of the concentration of MPs in winter and summer in the year 2020. The present study assessed if the increase in temperature combined with the increase in equivalent population would also increase the concentration of MPs.A total of eighteen samples were collected, nine in winter (January, February and March) and nine in summer (July, August and September). Then the wastewater was treated to remove the liquid element and organic load so that only the MPs remained. Among the various categories, fibers and fragments were detected. They were divided into four groups according to their size with a lower limit of 20 µm and the following was calculated:• The concentration of MPs (fragments, fibers) per month• The concentration of MPs (fragments, fibers) per period• The average daily concentration of MPs (fragments, fibers)The mean daily concentration was calculated to be 13. 5 ± 3.12 (MPs/L). In the winter season the concentration was estimated at 2 ± 0.36 (MPs/L) while in the spring season the concentration increased dramatically to 25 ± 4.8 (MPs/L) with the fragments category occupying eighty-six percent (86 %) of the total sample and fibers only fourteen percent (14%).

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