Distinct soil microplastic distributions under various farmland-use types around Urumqi, China

Abstract

Very little is known about the occurrence of microplastics in the soils of various land uses, especially their distributional characteristics in the soils of arid areas. In this study, 24 sampling sites across three soil layers were investigated for three different farmland-use types (greenhouses, crop fields and vegetable fields) in the main agricultural and pastoral areas around Urumqi, China. The results demonstrated that the dominant sizes of soil microplastics were 0.2–0.5 and 0.5–1.0 mm, the main shape was film (85.93 %), the main color was white, and the main polymer was polyethylene (93.1 %), indicating that most microplastics derive from the damage to residual mulches. The microplastics abundance was highest in the greenhouse plots (7763 ± 2773 items/kg), followed by the vegetable plots (4128 ± 2235 items/kg) and then the crop fields (3178 ± 3172 items/kg). No significant differences were observed among the abundances of microplastics in the 0–10 cm (1822 ± 1345 items/kg), 10–20 cm (1566 ± 1139 items/kg) and 20–30 cm (1309 ± 1028 items/kg) layers, suggesting that microplastics can migrate to the deeper soil layer and are strongly influenced by tillage disturbance. The abundance of microplastics in the north of Urumqi was found to be higher than in the south, which is closely related to the division of agricultural functional zones and the intensity of agricultural management practices. It was found that different cropping characteristics and modes of agricultural use affect the abundance and migration of microplastics in various farmland-use types, and thus their distribution. This study provides important data for follow-up research on microplastics in arid terrestrial ecosystems, and corresponding policy-making on the management of these materials.