JPI Oceans - Mikroplast - BASEMAN - NILU - Defining the baselines and standards for microplastics analyses in European waters
Informations
- Funding country
Norway- Acronym
- -
- URL
- -
- Start date
- 1/1/2015
- End date
- 12/31/2019
- Budget
- 74,661 EUR
Fundings
| Name | Role | Start | End | Amount |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Marine Resources and the Environment (MARINFORSK) - call 2016 | Grant | - | - | 74,661 EUR |
Abstract
A fundamental issue precluding assessment of the environmental risks arising from microplastics is the lack of standard methods for microplastics sampling and detection. Consequently there is a lack of reliable data on concentrations of microplastics and the composition of polymers within the marine environment. BASEMAN is an interdisciplinary and international collaborative research project that aims to overcome this problem. BASEMAN teams experienced scientists (from different disciplines and countries) to undertake a profound and detailed comparison and evaluation of all approaches from sampling to identification of microplastics. BASEMAN deployed cutting-edge approaches to tackle the two major themes of the call: 1) The validation and harmonisation of analytical methods which is indispensable for 2), the identification and quantification of microplastics. Both tasks were met with challenges since 1) The manufacture of standard material was much more challenging than anticipated and resulted varying quality and 2) the use of a variety of identification methods resulted in a different set of data and sensitivity. However, the application of a set of identification methods will allow for a broad set of matrices analysed as well as particle sizes and effort applied, if applied according to the research question. NILU focused on the contribution to the method testing for water, fish, and plankton. We also participated with methods for mussels, together with testing of several instrumentations for the identification of plastic polymers. BASEMAN contributed directly to the successful application of a NFR INTPART project. A masterstudent is now applying this methodology as well as that we transfer methods suggested by BASEMAN to the PLASTPOLL project (INTPART) to Chinese and American research groups.