Membrane and Water Treatment

Volume 13, Number 1, 2022, pages 21-28

DOI: 10.12989/mwt.2022.13.1.021

Microplastic release from damaged commercial teabags

Sion Kim, Eun Ha Jo and Soohoon Choi

Abstract

The use of plastics in our everyday lives have been drastically increased during the last few decades. However with the usage of commercial plastic products there is a possibility of microplastic consumption, due to the fragmentation of the products. Additionally, the potential for microplastic ingestion may also be increased by using damaged products. Hence, the current study was conducted to understand the potential release of micro/nano plastics and organic matter from damaged teabags. To check the leakage tendency, the amount of damage to the tea bags from 1-10 cm were tested along with temperatures of 25-70

Key Words

microplastic; microplastic release; organic leachate; SEM analysis; teabags

Address

Sion Kim and Eun Ha Jo: Department of Environmental & IT Engineering, Chungnam University, 99 Daehak-ro, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 34134, Korea Soohoon Choi: Department of Environmental Engineering, Chungnam University, 99 Daehak-ro, Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 34134, Korea