Understanding the overland transport of microplastics from agricultural soils to freshwater systems

摘要: The increasing recognition that significant amounts of plastic are disposed of and accumulating in agricultural soils has highlighted the need for increased research in the study area. Once on soils, MP may be transported through vertical migration and/or overland surface runoff, with processes governing the overland runoff pathway to freshwater systems being poorly understand. Here we present a study of MP transport from soils through overland flow processes. The research utilised a medium-scale, laboratory based, rainfall simulator that facilitated experimental testing of multiple variables that influence MP mobilisation and export from field settings under controlled conditions. A total of 15 experiments were conducted across four separate test series in which differences in MP characteristics (including particle shape, size and density), rainfall regime (including intensity and duration), catchment topography (slope …