Researchers identify nanoplastics on Sonnblick
This is proven by the research results of an international group of scientists – including the head of the Sonnblick Observatory, Elke Ludewig from the Central Institute for Meteorology and Geodynamics. The findings have now been published in the journal “Environmental Pollution”.
Researchers were able to reconstruct transport routes
With the help of wind and weather data, the scientists working with Dusan Materic from the University of Utrecht (Netherlands) were able to reconstruct the origin of the plastic particles and their transport. According to this, around 30 percent of the tiny particles smaller than one micrometer come from urban values that are no more than 200 kilometers away from Sonnblick.
However, the data also indicate long-range and global transport. Ten percent of the detected nanoplastic particles came from a distance of more than 2,000 kilometers. Part of the source of the nanoplastics is in the Atlantic, where it appears to be airborne via the spray of the waves.
nanoplastic
Nanoplastic is the term for a worldwide, human-caused environmental pollution from tiny plastic particles, which are even smaller than microplastics with a size of one to 1,000 nanometers.
Distribution so far hardly used
The researchers measured the deposits for around one and a half months in late winter 2017. The Federal Materials Testing and Research Institute (EMPA), from which Dominik Brunner was involved in the study, emphasizes that the study is new scientific territory, and the spread of nanoplastics through the air is largely unexplored to this day.
It is the most accurate assessment of nanoplastic air pollution that has been carried out more quickly.
Values and effects need to be checked
The determined average deposition rate of 42 kilograms of nanoplastics per square kilometer and year is associated with a large uncertainty factor, the value can be between 17 and 74 kilograms, the researchers write in the work. In addition, the numbers would only be based on a single study, said Brunner from the EMPA in an interview with the Keystone-SDA news agency.
The values – as well as the health effects – would therefore have to be checked in further studies. Then meaningful assessments of the pollution of the air and the Alpine region by nanoplastics could also be made. New and more precise measurements at ZAMG’s Sonnblick observatory are already planned.
Current pictures from last week, photographed outside the core zone of the national park with tele…
Proprietary chemical process
The fact that the data on nanoplastics is still extremely incomplete can be attributed in particular to the fact that measuring this smallest particle represents an analytical challenge. The research team has therefore developed a chemical method to determine the contamination of the samples by nanoplastics using a mass spectrometer.
It is estimated that more than 4,900 million tons of plastics have entered the environment to date, where they fragment into smaller and smaller particles. However, researchers still know little about the ecological and health effects of these tiny particles, especially nanoplastics.