Papers

61,005 results
|
Article Tier 2

Towards a model for road runoff infiltration management

Researchers analyzed over 2,400 chemical micropollutants in stormwater runoff from roads, tracking how well infiltration ponds — engineered soil systems — trapped these contaminants before they reached groundwater. Sand in the infiltration pond retained 86% of micropollutant abundance, and the study proposes a practical model linking soil properties to pollutant trapping efficiency.

2021 npj Clean Water 8 citations
Article Tier 2

Removal and fate of microplastics in permeable pavements: An experimental layer-by-layer analysis

Researchers tested permeable pavements as a way to capture microplastics from urban stormwater runoff and found they retained 89% to over 99% of microplastic particles. The microplastics accumulated mainly on the pavement surface and in geotextile filter layers, preventing them from reaching natural waterways. This type of sustainable urban drainage could be an effective tool for reducing the amount of microplastics that wash off roads and into the water sources people depend on.

2024 The Science of The Total Environment 15 citations
Article Tier 2

'ALL ROADS FLOW TO THE SEA' – capturing road-based plastic pollution using physical and community interventions

Researchers developed customized drain basket interventions called 'Drain Buddies' fitted with 300 micron mesh nets to capture road-based microplastics -- including tyre wear particles, road paint, and synthetic grass fibres -- before they enter aquatic environments via stormwater drains.

2024 Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research)
Article Tier 2

Simultaneous Removal of Organic Pollutants and Pathogens from Stormwater by an Enhanced Ecological Gabion

Scientists developed an improved storm drain filter system that removes harmful chemicals and disease-causing bacteria from stormwater runoff much better than traditional systems. The new design uses special materials like biochar along with plants to clean polluted water before it reaches rivers and lakes that people use for drinking water and recreation. This could help protect public health by preventing contaminated stormwater from spreading pollution and germs into our water sources.

2026 Toxics
Article Tier 2

Análisis del comportamiento hidráulico y ambiental a largo plazo de pavimentos permeables y de su potencial para el control de microplásticos en la gestión avanzada de escorrentías urbanas

Researchers investigated the long-term hydraulic and environmental performance of permeable pavements for controlling microplastics in urban stormwater runoff, demonstrating their potential to prevent suspended solids and associated microplastic particles from reaching the environment.

2024
Article Tier 2

Evaluation of a Modular Filter Concept to Reduce Microplastics and Other Solids from Urban Stormwater Runoff

Researchers developed and bench-tested a modular decentralized stormwater filter system using sieves, sedimentation barriers, floating barriers, and a magnetic module, demonstrating effective retention of microplastics, tire powder, and other particulate matter across a range of rain intensities.

2023 Water 6 citations
Article Tier 2

Occurrence and concentration of 20–100 μm sized microplastic in highway runoff and its removal in a gross pollutant trap – Bioretention and sand filter stormwater treatment train

A stormwater gross pollutant trap followed by bioretention and sand filter treatment was found to remove 20 to 100 micrometer microplastics from highway runoff in addition to larger particles, with removal efficiency dependent on particle size and treatment train configuration.

2021 The Science of The Total Environment 82 citations
Review Tier 2

Modelling microplastics in bioretention systems: A review

This review examines existing mathematical models for describing microplastic transport, removal, and fragmentation within bioretention systems used for urban stormwater management. The authors identify gaps in mechanistic understanding of how microplastics move through engineered porous media and how they affect the hydrology and performance of these low-impact development systems.

2024 1 citations
Article Tier 2

Permeable pavement blocks as a sustainable solution for managing microplastic pollution in urban stormwater

Researchers tested whether permeable pavement, the kind of pavement that lets water drain through it, can filter out microplastics from urban stormwater runoff. They found it can trap microplastic particles effectively, suggesting permeable pavement could be a practical tool for reducing the amount of microplastics that wash into rivers and oceans from city streets.

2025 The Science of The Total Environment 12 citations
Article Tier 2

Understanding the dynamics of microplastics transport in urban stormwater runoff: Implications for pollution control and management

Researchers modeled how microplastics travel through urban stormwater runoff into water bodies. They found that a microplastic's shape, size, and density strongly influence whether it settles or floats during transport, and that local factors like street slope and surface friction significantly affect how quickly particles reach storm drains. The findings could help cities design better stormwater management strategies to capture microplastics.

2024 Environmental Pollution 21 citations
Article Tier 2

'ALL ROADS FLOW TO THE SEA' – capturing road-based plastic pollution using physical and community interventions

Researchers assessed road-based microplastic pollution using 'Drain Buddies' — custom mesh basket inserts installed in 15 stormwater drains in Queensland, Australia — collecting and analyzing over 1,500 putative plastic particles across eight sampling cycles between 2021 and 2023. They found that roads serve as significant conduits for microplastics including tyre wear particles, paint fragments, and synthetic grass fibers entering aquatic systems.

2024 Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research)
Article Tier 2

Microplastics in gully pot sediment in urban areas: Presence, quantities and characteristics

Researchers analyzed sediment from 29 urban gully pots — the roadside drains that funnel stormwater into sewer pipes — and found concentrations of up to 10,600 microplastic particles per 100g of sediment, with tire wear particles making up roughly a third. The study shows gully pots act as temporary traps for microplastics before they flush into waterways, and that maintaining and cleaning them could reduce the flow of microplastics into rivers and the ocean. This is a practical, infrastructure-based intervention point for cutting urban microplastic pollution.

2024 Environmental Pollution 3 citations
Article Tier 2

Geometry-Driven Prediction of Microplastic Transport in Saturated Sediments: Fast and Memory-Efficient Pore-Scale Modeling

Scientists developed a new computer model that can predict how fast tiny plastic particles move through soil and sediment when water flows through them. This matters because microplastics can carry harmful chemicals like pesticides and heavy metals as they travel underground, potentially contaminating drinking water sources and groundwater. The model helps researchers understand where these plastic pollutants might end up and how quickly they could reach water supplies that people depend on.

2026
Article Tier 2

Design of model microplastics to study their transport in urban waters

Researchers designed model microplastic particles with controlled physical properties to systematically study their transport behavior in urban water systems. The work provides a foundation for understanding how microplastic size, density, and shape influence fate and transport in stormwater and urban drainage networks.

2025 SPIRE - Sciences Po Institutional REpository
Article Tier 2

Catchment-scale mechanistic predictions of microplastic transport and distribution across land and water

Researchers developed the first catchment-scale model successfully predicting microplastic transport from land to water, validated against field data, revealing how soil accumulation, runoff dynamics, and in-stream transport interact to determine where microplastics concentrate before reaching the ocean.

2022 4 citations
Article Tier 2

Modeling the transport of microplastics along river networks

Researchers built a mathematical model to predict how microplastics travel through river networks, combining water flow dynamics with estimates of human plastic inputs. They tested the model against real-world data from three river systems worldwide and found it reliably predicted microplastic concentrations. The tool could help identify pollution hotspots and guide cleanup priorities across entire river basins.

2023 The Science of The Total Environment 28 citations
Article Tier 2

Application of Porous Concrete Infiltration Techniques to Street Stormwater Inlets That Simultaneously Mitigate against Non-Point Heavy Metal Pollution and Stormwater Runoff Reduction in Urban Areas: Catchment-Scale Evaluation of the Potential of Discrete and Small-Scale Techniques

This is a civil engineering review on using porous concrete in stormwater inlets to reduce runoff and filter heavy metals in urban areas; it is not a microplastics research paper.

2023 Water 9 citations
Article Tier 2

Eficiencia de los pavimentos permeables para la retención de microplásticos de la escorrentía urbana

Researchers evaluated the effectiveness of permeable pavements as sustainable urban drainage systems for retaining microplastics from urban stormwater runoff, testing their performance under controlled laboratory conditions calibrated to average rainfall patterns in Valencia, Spain. Results showed a significant reduction in microplastic particle counts in water passing through the permeable pavement layers.

2024
Article Tier 2

Unveiling the Potential: Selecting Optimal Materials for Physical Pools in a Pavement-Runoff-Integrated Treatment System

This paper is not about microplastics; it tests different gravel sizes and activated carbon types as filtration and adsorption materials for removing petroleum and heavy metals from pavement stormwater runoff.

2023 Water 1 citations
Article Tier 2

Bioswales as potential sinks for tyre wear particle pollution

Researchers investigated the role of bioswale green infrastructure in capturing tyre wear particle microplastics from road runoff, presenting data from bioswales constructed in 2010 and quantifying their effectiveness as sinks for tyre-derived microplastic pollution.

2024
Article Tier 2

Impact of bed morphology on microplastic transport at a confluence between a channel and a pipeline

Researchers used laboratory flume experiments to investigate how bed morphology at a 90-degree confluence between an open channel and a pipeline affects the transport dynamics of microplastics, identifying key hydraulic conditions that control particle routing in urban drainage systems.

2025 Journal of Hazardous Materials
Article Tier 2

A Novel Application of Filtration for the Collection of Microplastics in Waterways

Researchers developed a novel filtration system for collecting microplastics from waterways, demonstrating its effectiveness as a scalable and practical tool for environmental monitoring and plastic pollution assessment.

2024 Research Square (Research Square)
Article Tier 2

Microplastic sampling strategies in urban drainage systems for quantification of urban emissions based on transport pathways

Researchers developed and applied microplastic sampling strategies across an entire urban municipal catchment under both dry and wet weather conditions, finding that wastewater treatment plants remove over 96% of microplastics but still emit 189 kg per year, while wet-weather emissions from high-traffic subcatchments reached 1,952 grams per population equivalent per year, far exceeding dry-weather levels.

2023 Applied Research 4 citations
Article Tier 2

Investigating the fate and transport of microplastics in a lagoon wastewater treatment system using a multimedia model approach

Researchers developed a multimedia model to predict microplastic fate and transport in a lagoon-based wastewater treatment system, finding high overall removal efficiency with sedimentation as the dominant removal mechanism.

2023 Journal of Hazardous Materials 12 citations