Microplastics in municipal wastewater treatment plants: a case study of Denizli/Turkey

Highlights

● High amounts of microplastics are released to receiving media from WWTPs.

● The effect of classical treatment processes on MP removal is important.

● MP load in the effluent of WWTPs is important for developing treatment technology.

● Additional physical treatment could help further reduce MP discharge.

Abstract

Plastic particles smaller than 5 mm are microplastics. They are among the significant pollutants that recently attracted attention. Great quantities of microplastics enter the sewage system daily and reach wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). As a result, WWTPs are potential microplastic sources. Hence, they create a pathway for microplastics to reach aquatic environments with treated wastewater discharge. Studies on microplastic characterization in WWTPs have gained momentum in academia. This study investigates the abundance, size, shape, color, polymer type, and removal efficiencies of microplastics in a municipal wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) in Denizli/Turkey. The results showed that the dominant microplastic shape in wastewater samples was fibers (41.78%–60.77%) in the 100–500 µm (58.57%–80.07%) size range. Most of the microplastics were transparent-white (32.86%–58.93%). The dominant polymer types were polyethylene (54.05%) and polyethylene vinyl acetate (37.84%) in raw wastewater. Furthermore, the microplastic removal efficiencies of the Denizli Central WWTP as a whole and for individual treatment units were evaluated. Although the microplastic pollution removal efficiency of the Denizli Central WWTP was over 95%, the microplastic concentration discharged daily into the receiving environment was considerably high (1.28 × 10¹⁰ MP/d). Thus, Denizli Central WWTP effluents result in a high volume of emissions in terms of microplastic pollution with a significant daily discharge to the Çürüksu Stream.

Graphical abstract

Keywords

Microplastics / Wastewater treatment plant / Removal efficiency / Daily discharge

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Pamukkale University Scientific Research Project (Turkey) (No. 2019FEBE009).

Author Contributions

Pelin Koyuncuoğlu: Methodology, Validation, Experimental analysis, Investigation, Writing-original draft, Visualization. Gülbin Erden: Supervision, Review and Editing.

Availability of Data and Materials

Data sharing does not apply to this article, as no datasets were generated or analyzed during the current study.

Electronic Supplementary Material

Supplementary material is available in the online version of this article at https://doi.org/10.1007/s11783-023-1699-8 and is accessible to authorized users.

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