Microplastics in Korean beach: Spatial distribution, Composition, and associated Organic contamination

Abstract

Currently, marine debris is of global environmental concern. A large portion of marine debris consists of plastics. Plastic materials that were discarded, disposed or abandoned at sea are broken down to microplastics through natural weathering processes such as degradation under UV radiation and abrasion by wave action. Microplastics enter marine environment by other means such as sea transportation or in industrial accidents. The microplastics are capable of adsorbing organic contaminants from water column acting as a useful monitoring tool for marine pollution. In order to understand the contamination status and characteristics of microplastics pollution in Korea, we conducted a beach monitoring survey and subsequently chemical analysis. The density of plastic debris was high at the upper tidal zone. < 5mm size plastics were dominant. Plastic fragments and fibers less than 1mm were also abundantly observed. Interestingly, expended polystyrene (EPS) was the major microplastics of the beach. The average number of microplastics on the beach was 1300 EPS and 16 pellets per m2. This is primarily due to the extensive use of EPS buoy in the aquaculture in Korea. EPS distribution was more at the upper tidal zone than plastic pellets. Persistent organic contaminants such as PCBs, DDTs, and PAHs were detectable in both EPS and the pellet. The POPs concentration was relatively high in pellets o