Review
Microplastics in the Bay of Biscay: An overview

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.marpolbul.2020.110996Get rights and content

Highlights

  • The Bay of Biscay presents a medium level of MP pollution.

  • A high spatial and temporal variability is found in each marine compartment.

  • Polypropylene, polyethylene, polyester and polystyrene are most frequent MPs.

  • Harmonisation of methods to study the abundance of MPs is needed.

Abstract

Microplastics (MPs) are an environmental problem of growing concern, and several studies have defined the Bay of Biscay (BoB) as a marine litter accumulation area. To address the abundance of MPs in this region, a critical overview is presented compiling the research performed to date on the different water bodies, sediments and biota. The comparative assessment highlights high spatial and temporal variability in MP distribution. MPs appear in at least 50% of the samples in waters and sediments. Polypropylene, polyethylene, polyester and polystyrene are the most frequent polymers, with a significant predominance of fragments and fibres. The BoB can be considered a region with medium concentration of MPs. However, monitoring programmes are needed to compile data over time and thus evaluate the historical trends of MP pollution. The difficulty of comparing studies is highlighted, due to the use of different methodologies. Hence, the harmonisation of monitoring methods is urgently required.

Introduction

The large-scale production of plastics began in the 1950s. Since then, the versatility of plastics, their cost-effectiveness and the increase in widespread consumption habits together with the global population growth have led to an exponential increase in the demand of this material worldwide, from 2 metric tonnes (Mt) in the early 1950s to 348 million Mt in 2017 (GESAMP, 2015; PlasticsEurope, 2018). Around half of the plastics produced are designed for single-use applications (packaging of food and beverages, packaging of products for transport, etc.), and therefore has a short life-span. As a result, according to Geyer and co-workers, between 1950 and 2015, 6300 million Mt of plastic waste has been produced, of which only 9% have been recycled, 12% incinerated, and 79% accumulated in landfill or the natural environment (Geyer et al., 2017). Seas and oceans are the final destinations of a large part of the plastic waste released into nature since they are at the lowest level in the drainage direction of inland waters, and because approximately half of the world's population lives in coastal areas, within 60 km from the shoreline (UNEP, 2016). According to Jambeck et al. (2015), between 4.8 and 12.7 million Mt of plastic enters the seas and oceans yearly.

Plastics at sea are usually classified by three size ranges: micro- (≤5 mm), meso- (5 mm to 2.5 cm), and macro-plastics (2.5 cm – 1 m) (see e.g. Galgani et al., 2013; Lippiatt et al., 2013). Some authors have also included two additional categories: the mega-plastics (>1 m), and nano-plastics (≤ either 1000 nm or 100 nm), although the terms are currently under scientific debate (Lippiatt et al., 2013; Gigault et al., 2018; da Costa et al., 2016).

There is a growing interest and concern towards the smaller range of plastic particles. Microplastics (MPs) are ubiquitous at sea, even in the most remote areas and deep sea beds (Barnes et al., 2009; Ryan et al., 2009; Woodall et al., 2014; Cózar et al., 2017; Sanchez-Vidal et al., 2018). There is also evidence that MPs enter food webs, as they have been detected in planktonic invertebrates, benthic invertebrates, fish, sea birds, marine mammals or sea turtles (see e.g. Lusher, 2015). Hence, it makes necessary to expand the research on their sinks and sources, and the effects at different scales (locally, regionally and globally) and compartments (water, biota, sediments). In this way, the European Marine Strategy Framework Directive (hereinafter MSFD) adopted in 2008 (European Commission, 2008), establishes a set of characteristics for good marine environmental status, where descriptor 10, related to marine litter, states that “Properties and quantities of marine litter do not cause harm to the coastal and marine environment”. The amount, distribution, and composition of micro-litter (classified in the categories ‘artificial polymer materials’ and ‘other’) are specifically considered as criteria to assess this descriptor. Hence, MPs are included as one of the indicators for the evaluation of marine environmental quality (Gago et al., 2015), prescribing mandatory monitoring, in order to establish the concentration, distribution, properties and potential impacts of the MPs.

The Bay of Biscay (hereinafter BoB) is a marine region located in the north-east of the Atlantic Ocean, including the coasts of the north of Spain and the west of France. Despite that recent studies highlight this region as a marine litter accumulation area due to its particular physical oceanography (Gago et al., 2015; van den Beld et al., 2017; Lebreton et al., 2012; van Sebille et al., 2012; Pereiro et al., 2019), the information on MPs distribution and total amounts is limited. This contribution intends to identify all the studies conducted on the occurrence of MPs in this region regarding its presence in coastal and oceanic waters, marine sediments, beaches and biota. Results are evaluated to assess the global situation in the region in terms of MPs occurrence. As a result, potential trends have been established, providing a preliminary assessment of the environmental status in this European region. Also, a monitoring strategy proposal for this marine region with regard to MPs in the framework of the MSFD implementation is discussed.

Section snippets

Geomorphology

The BoB (43–48° N, 0–10° W) is a semi-enclosed gulf located in the north-east of the Atlantic Ocean (Fig. 1). It includes the maritime area that embraces the coasts from Cape Ortegal (Galicia) to the tip of Pern (French Brittany), occupying a surface area of approximately 175,000 km2 (Valdés and Lavín, 2002). It is included in the Region IV (BoB and Iberian Coast) of the OSPAR Commission. The BoB has diverse topography and coastal lines, including a continental shelf with changing width in the

Methods and research design

The literature review on MPs in the BoB was conducted using Science Direct directory as well as Scopus and Web of Science databases, by searching for keywords “Bay of Biscay” AND “microplastics”/“plastic pellets”/“plastic fibers”/“plastic fibres”. These databases were chosen because they cover most of the science journals worldwide. Nine studies were found related to the occurrence of MPs in the BoB. The search was complemented with information obtained from studies, technical reports, as well

Discussion: gaps and challenges

According to the studies conducted in the BoB, MPs appeared in all sampled compartments in a wide range of abundances (see Table 5). Although scarce, there are data on all marine compartments in the region except on the water column below 11 m depth, where no studies have been found. MPs were present in at least 50% of the samples in surface waters and sediments, with 100% occurrence in some cases (Gago et al., 2015; Woodall et al., 2014; Phuong et al., 2018a). The predominance of fragments and

Conclusion

Based on the data compiled to date, the abundance of MPs in the BoB could be considered as a medium level for the different marine compartments, by comparing with mean values obtained in the oceans worldwide (Table 5). However, it is necessary to highlight the difficulty of the comparative exercise between the studies, due to the use of different methodologies. Hence, an urgent consensus is needed in order to standardise MPs sampling and analysis methodologies in all compartments and obtain

Declaration of competing interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Provincial Council of Gipuzkoa (ItsasMikro project) and the European Union (LIFE LEMA project, LIFE15/ENV/ES/000252). This paper is contribution n° 958 AZTI. The plastic sampling during ETOILE campaign was partially supported by the JERICO-NEXT project, funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 654410. This work has also been supported by the ECOPES project (funded by the Department of Economic

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