Micro-plastics in the Vicinity of an Urban Solid Waste Management Facility in India: Assessment and Policy Implications

The study focuses on analyzing the presence and quantity of microplastics near an unscientific solid waste dumping site located at Kochi city in India and thereby assessing the contribution of massive open dumping towards microplastic pollution in the river. Two sets of sampling with three sediment samples from nearby Kadambrayar river and five topsoil samples from various parts of the Brahmapuram waste dumping yard were carried out during January - February 2019. The samples were analyzed as per the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (US NOAA) protocol. ATR-FTIR and DSC analysis based characterization indicated that polyethylene dominated the micro plastics followed by polypropylene and polystyrene. The size distribution of particles showed that comparatively larger particles of size range between 2.36 - 4.75 mm were present in the topsoil than that in river sediments which had more number of particles in size range below 2.36 mm. The study confirmed the presence of an average of 100 microplastic pieces per 100 gram of sediments of Kadambrayar river bordering the waste dumping yard at Brahmapuram. The topsoil of Brahmapuram waste dumping yard was found to contain 178 pieces of microplastics per 100 gm of soil. Microplastics are found to be high in the river stretch near the open dumping site which has a significant role in the pollution, causing a major threat to the entire ecosystem.