A Review of the Distribution, Characteristics and Environmental Fate of Microplastics in Different Environments of China

Abstract

Microplastics (MPs) are ubiquitously present in different environmental media that can lead to potential hazards to the global ecosystem and human health. As the largest producer and user of plastics in the world, the abundance and characteristics of MPs contamination in various environmental media in China deserve to be paid more attention. To assess the ecological and environmental risks of MPs, their abundance, sources and contamination characteristics in different environmental media in China were investigated. In this review, MPs data from 1862 sampling sites in six environmental media in China have been collected. The mean abundance of MPs in different environmental media was then summarized and analyzed, which was 160.35 ± 114.68 items m−3 in seawater, 413.91 ± 216.02 items kg−1 in seawater sediments, 3546.38 ± 382.61 items m−3 in inland water, 1297.71 ± 910.47 items kg−1 in inland water sediments, 1987.86 ± 1004.31 items kg−1 in soils, and 119.68 ± 85.40 items m−2 d−1 in atmospheric fallout, respectively. The sizes of MPs were mainly < 1 mm, and the types of MPs were mainly polypropylene, polyethylene and polyethylene terephthalate. In addition, we discussed the challenges posed by the inadequacy of MPs detection methods for the analysis of MPs contaminated areas and provided prospects on future research on MPs contamination. This review can improve our understanding of the pollution characteristics of MPs in China, illustrate the migration and transformation patterns of MPs in the overall environment, and provide reliable reference data for the development of MPs detection standards.