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Removal of microplastics via wastewater treatment plants in india: Current knowledge and future directions: a review
Summary
This review examined the capacity of wastewater treatment plants in India to remove microplastics, synthesizing current knowledge on removal efficiencies and identifying major knowledge gaps and future research priorities. While WWTPs remove a substantial fraction of incoming microplastics, effluents still discharge particles into receiving water bodies, and sludge represents a concentrated secondary contamination pathway.
The occurrence of microplastics in wastewater treatment systems has increasingly become a major environmental challenge these days. Both marine and freshwater ecosystems are found to be contaminated with microplastics, and detected in various biological systems, hampering ecological sustainability. Wastewater treatment plants are considered a prominent source of releasing microplastics into the various riverine systems. Though microplastics abundance and removal efficacy in different wastewater treatment plants have been extensively studied worldwide, such studies are really scarce in Indian environmental conditions. Since effluents from WWTPs were considered a source of microplastics in freshwater bodies and riverine bodies, Therefore, understanding the behaviours of wastewater treatment processes and the fates of microplastics in wastewater treatment plants is very important. Studies found that WWTPs are an important sink for microplastics generated by domestic or industrial sources, and their removal depends on the microplastic load in the influent water and treatment technologies. In this paper, we systematically reviewed the available knowledge on the removal of microplastics from different wastewater treatment plants in India. This will offer a new perspective on the threat of microplastics in water to human health and help to formulate effective strategies for microplastic monitoring. Additionally, the potential challenges of microplastic removal from wastewater treatment processes were also put forward. This study also reveals the importance of microplastics studies in various wastewater treatment plants, signifying the attention required on the hazardous impact of microplastics on aquatic biota and subsequent potential ill effects on human health. The behaviour of microplastics changes during the different treatment processes and is suggested to be explored in the future. Keyword: Microplastics, wastewater, riverine Also see: https://micro2024.sciencesconf.org/559164/document