Anthropogenic particles in sediment from an Arctic fjord

Abstract

The research on plastic pollution is increasing worldwide but little is known about the contamination levels in the Arctic by microplastics and other anthropogenic particles (APs) such as dyed fibres. In this study, two different sampling designs were developed to collect 68 sediment subsamples in five locations in a remote Arctic fjord, Kongsfjorden, northwest of Svalbard. Those five stations composed a transect from a sewage outlet recently installed close to the northernmost settlement, Ny-Ålesund, to an offshore site. Plastics and other APs were extracted by density separation and analysed by both Raman and Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy. Among the 37 APs found, 19 were microplastics. The others were classified as APs due to the presence of a dye or another additive. On average, 0.33 AP 100 g−1 were found in the surface sediment and their sizes ranged between 0.10 and 6.31 mm. The site most polluted by APs was located at the mouth of the fjord while the less polluted ones were the offshore and the outlet sites. We believe that currents in the fjord have carried APs towards the mouth of the fjord where an eddy could retain APs which might sink the seafloor due to various reasons (ingestion & packaging, fouling-induced changes in buoyancy). In the cores, several different APs were found down to a depth of 12 cm. These APs may have been present in the sediments for decades or been transported deeper by biota. Here we provided data on plastic but also on other anthropogenic particles from a remote fjord in Svalbard.