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Spatial Distribution and Abundance of Emerging Microplastics Pollutants in Groundwater of UAE
Tatan, Bushra
Tatan, Bushra
Date
2023-06
Author
Advisor
Type
Thesis
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Description
A Master of Science thesis in Civil Engineering by Bushra Tatan entitled, “Spatial Distribution and Abundance of Emerging Microplastics Pollutants in Groundwater of UAE”, submitted in June 2023. Thesis advisor is Dr. Md. Mortula and thesis co-advisor is Dr. Tarig Ali. Soft copy is available (Thesis, Completion Certificate, Approval Signatures, and AUS Archives Consent Form).
Abstract
Global production of plastics is expected to keep on increasing as consumption increases. Plastics are known to undergo disintegration in the environment resulting in the formation of microplastics. Microplastics pollution is growing, but few studies have considered assessment of contamination in groundwater. This might be due to lack of monitoring groundwater for microplastics contamination. However, groundwater is a common source of water in various industries globally. In the UAE, more than half of the water supply is from groundwater, specifically in the agricultural industries. This study aimed to investigate microplastics contamination in groundwater in the UAE. The study identified 30 groundwater boreholes in the Rahmaniya, Bedee, and Falah regions of Sharjah, UAE, from which samples were collected. To prepare the samples, a series of pretreatment procedures involving 30% hydrogen peroxide, density separation, and extraction filters were employed. Microplastics were subsequently detected using a microscope with 40x magnification, revealing the presence of microplastics in the water of 11 boreholes in Rahmaniya, ranging from 12 to 235 n/L, respectively. In the Falah area, contamination was observed in two boreholes, with 56 and 41 n/L, respectively, while no contamination was found in the Bedee area. Characterization of microplastics was conducted using ATR-FTIR analysis, which has successfully matched the obtained spectra with polyethylene terephthalate, polyethylene, and polypropylene for 10 samples. To examine the spatial variability and clustering of microplastics, a raster layer was created in GIS and used to perform hotspot analysis. The findings demonstrated a significant hotspot in the Rahmaniya area, indicating concentrated microplastics contamination. Moreover, potential sources of contamination were investigated based on land use and location, and three remote sensing-based indices, which are the Normalized Difference Water Index (NDWI), Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and moisture index. This has helped in the identification of industrial areas, the Sajaa landfill, Bedee Farmland, and the water dump lagoon as potential sources of contamination.