Airborne microplastics in Bandung and Osaka: concentration and characteristics

Abstract

Plastic is a material that is widely used in everyday life. It can be degraded into small-sized fragments (< 5 mm) called microplastics (MPs). Research on MPs has primarily focused on the aquatic environment, while studies on airborne MPs (AMPs) are still in their early stages. In this study, AMPs at two locations (Bandung (Indonesia) and Osaka (Japan)) were characterized by attenuated total imaging and micro-Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, as a preliminary study. The concentrations of AMPs in total suspended particulates (TSP) in Bandung and Osaka ranged from 1.03 to 14.27 particles/m3 and from 0.63 to 3.29 particles/m3, respectively. AMPs in both locations were fragmented, with dominant Feret diameters ranging from 1 to 20 μm.