Abstract
Marine debris is widely recognized as a global environmental problem. One of its main components, microplastics, has been found in several sea salt samples from different countries, indicating that sea products are irremediably contaminated by microplastics. Previous studies show very confusing results, reporting amounts of microparticles (MPs) in salt ranging from zero to 680 MPs/kg, with no mention of the possible causes of such differences. Several errors in the experimental procedures used were found and are reported in the present work. Likewise, 21 different samples of commercial table salt from Spain have been analyzed for MPs content and nature. The samples comprise sea salts and well salts, before and after packing. The microplastic content found was of 50–280 MPs/kg salt, being polyethylene-terephthalate (PET) the most frequently found polymer, followed by polypropylene (PP) and polyethylene (PE), with no significant differences among all the samples. The results indicate that even though the micro-particles might originate from multiple sources, there is a background presence of microplastics in the environment.
Highlights
Marine debris is widely recognized as a global environmental problem
The materials which are most commonly found in marine debris comprise glass, metal, paper and plastic[4]; being plastic debris the most abundant in the marine environment[4,5,6,7,8]
The abundance and nature of the microplastics found have been analyzed by means of stereo microscopy and Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FT-IR)
Summary
Marine debris is widely recognized as a global environmental problem. One of its main components, microplastics, has been found in several sea salt samples from different countries, indicating that sea products are irremediably contaminated by microplastics. Recent studies showed that microplastics (fragments, fibers and pellets) are present in seas all over the world[14,15,16], only microfibers (not microbeads) where found in deep-sea organisms[13]. This lead to the hypothesis that sea salt might contain microplastics in it, because it is directly produced from seawater[17], pointing out the importance of monitoring the presence of such contaminants in sea salts. The abundance and nature of the microplastics found have been analyzed by means of stereo microscopy and Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FT-IR)
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