Progress towards monitoring of microlitter in Scandinavian marine environments

Microlitter consists of minute particles of anthropogenic or processed natural material. The project brings together research groups to conduct specific case studies in gradients from near urban sources such as the traffic environment and cities to the coastal water and sediments in order to study the relative occurrence of specific sources and their environmental dispersion and distribution. The conclusion were first that in sediments from the road environment (tunnel runoff water), tire particles, asphalt and road markings could be identified, and in the urban creek sediments many black particles including elastomers, charcoal-like and oil and soot where in high abundance and decreased rapidly out in the recipient. The results emphasize the role of the cities as hotspot source functions for microlitter in the coastal environment and also where mitigating measures could be directed.