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Estimating fossil carbon contributions from chemicals and microplastics in Sweden's urban wastewater systems: A model-based approach
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A modeling study estimated that fossil-derived carbon makes up roughly 12–17% of the total carbon flowing into Swedish municipal wastewater treatment plants, with microplastics accounting for about 13% of that fossil carbon fraction. This is relevant because wastewater treatment plants emit greenhouse gases, and IPCC guidelines now require accounting for fossil carbon separately from biogenic carbon in those emissions. The study provides a practical framework for other countries to estimate plastic-derived fossil carbon contributions to wastewater emissions inventories.
The importance of including fossil carbon in greenhouse gas emission assessments from wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) is highlighted in the 2019 Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) guidelines revision and underpinned by an increasing number of experimental studies. The present study introduces a model-based approach to estimate fossil carbon flows within Sweden's urban wastewater system, employing data on chemical and polymeric material flows as a starting point. Our findings show that fossil carbon constitutes approximately 12-17 % of the total carbon emissions to sewer systems. This result aligns with experimental data, which shows fossil carbon contributions to WWTP influents ranging from 4 to 28 %. Our analysis further indicates that microplastics contribute about 13 % of the fossil carbon influx to Swedish WWTPs, while organic chemicals account for the remaining 83 %.
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When a large batch of papers lands in the Atlas, we read through it and send a short write-up of what stood out.