MICROPLASTIC CONCENTRATIONS IN SURFACE AND TAP

WATER COLLECTED IN COLUMBIA, SOUTH CAROLINA

Technical Report

Submitted to Mr. Paul Rivera, WIS-TV Columbia

John E. Weinstein, Ph.D.

Professor and Department Head
Department of Biology
The Citadel
Charleston, SC 29412

Sarah E. Kell
Graduate Assistant
Graduate Program in Marine Biology
Grice Marine Laboratory
The University of Charleston, SC
Charleston, SC 29424

UPDATED: 18 December 2018

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

Water samples were collected from various locations around Columbia, South
Carolina on September 6 and November 29, 2018, to determine the quantity and type of
microplastics present. Sites included the Broad River (n=3), Lake Murray (n=2) and
drinking water faucets (n=6; Figure 1 and Table 1). Seven brands of bottled water were
also tested (Table 1).

METHODS
Surface water samples (n=1, 4-L), were collected from each site on the Broad
River and Lake Murray using a 2-mm mesh, 0.5 x 0.5 m aluminum frame, sea-surface
microlayer sampler (IOC, 1985). The screen was dipped into the waterbody surface and
the trapped water (~75 mL) was transferred into 4-L amber jugs. Drinking water
samples (n=1, 4-L, Wallace Street, W. Columbia Riverfront Park and the SC State
Capital; n=2, 4-L, WIS-TV, Finley Park and Hampton Greene Apt.) were collected by
filling the 4-L amber jugs directly from faucet heads. The bottled water was purchased
by WIS-TV personnel at a local convenience store in Columbia, SC. Sample volumes for
the bottled water were Dasani and Deer Lake 591 mL, Smart Water 500 mL, Fiji 500/750
mL, Nestle Splash Acai Grape, Aquafina and Perrier 500 mL.
Samples were volume reduced in the laboratory by pouring the water through a
63 µm stainless steel sieve. The items retained on the sieve were rinsed with deionized
water into a 250 mL amber glass jar. Samples were treated with 10 mL 30% H2O2 for
one week to digest any organic material. Following H2O2 digestion, microplastics were
characterized (based on shape and color) and quantified using a dissecting microscope
(Appendix A).
Suspected microplastics were confirmed to be plastic using the hot needle test
described by De Witte et al. (2014). The test was performed on four of the 18 samples
(22%). In the presence of a heated needle, plastic particles will melt or curl while
natural organic matter will not.

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QA/QC

To minimize contamination while handling and processing samples in the

laboratory, nitrile gloves and 100% white cotton coats were worn, and all tools and
glassware were cleaned with filtered distilled water. Potential plastic contamination
within the laboratory was quantified using procedural blanks. Procedural laboratory
blanks (n=6) contained 1.17 ± 0.28 microplastics/blank (mean ± standard error; SE)
(blank volume was 500 mL). The data reported hereafter were not corrected for
procedural contamination.

Figure 1. Microplastic sampling locations around Columbia, South Carolina.

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 Table 1. Geographic location information and corresponding Figure 1 locations.
Map
Number Location/Sample Latitude Longitude
1 Lake Murray Public Park 34° 2'15.79"N 81°13'7.09"W
2 Lake Murray Boat Club 34° 7'1.26"N 81°15'14.09"W
Three Rivers Greenway - Broad
3 River 34° 1'57.44"N 81° 4'5.76"
W. Columbia Riverfront Park-Broad
4 River 33°59'41.81"N 81° 3'8.63"W
Thomas Newman Boat Ramp -
5 Broad River 33°56'56.67"N 81° 1'44.20"
6 WIS-TV Tap Water 34° 0'8.03"N 81° 1'44.24"W
7 Finley Park Tap Water 34° 0'20.11"N 81° 2'24.30"W
8 Hampton Greene Apt. Tap Water 33°58'55.00"N 80°58'31.11"W
9 2210 Wallace Street Tap Water 34° 1'0.13"N 81° 2'9.92"W
W. Columbia Riverfront Park Tap
10 Water 33°59'40.45"N 81° 3'10.43"W
11 SC State House Tap Water 34° 0'1.09"N 81° 1'59.28"W
NA Dasani Bottled Water NA NA
NA Fiji Bottled Water NA NA
NA Deer Park Bottled Water NA NA
NA Smart Water NA NA
NA Nestle Splash Acai Grape NA NA
NA Aquafina NA NA
NA Perrier NA NA

RESULTS
Comparison of different brands of bottled water
• Sources of bottled water
o Aquafina – municipal water, no source provided, HYDRO-7 (tm) filtration
system
o Dasani - bottled in Atlanta, GA, reverse osmosis tap water
o Deer Park - spring water from Crystal Springs, Pasco County, FL and/or
Spring of Life, Lake County, FL
o Fiji – bottled at source, Yaqara, Viti Leva, Fiji Islands
o Nestle Splash Acai Grape – municipal or groundwater, no source
provided, reverse osmosis and/or distillation
o Perrier – mineral water bottled at source, Vergèze, Gard, France
o Smart Water - bottled in Morpeth, Northumberland, vapor distilled spring
water
• Deer Park had the highest concentration of microplastics at 5.08 particles/L
(Figure 2)

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 • No microplastics were found in the Aquafina and Nestle Splash brands
• Fiji brand – no microplastics were found in the 750 mL bottle but were present in
the 500 mL bottle tested
• Types of microplastic included grey fragments and black, clear and pink fibers

5
Microplastics/L

0
Aquafina Dasani Deer Park Fiji Fiji Nestle Perrier Smart
Bottled Bottled Bottled Bottled Splash Water
Water Water Water Water Acai
(500 mL) (750 mL) Grape

Figure 2. Microplastic concentrations in the brands of bottled water tested. No

microplastics were found in the Aquafina, Nestle Splash and Fiji (750 mL) brand bottled
water.

Comparison of tap water vs. bottled water

• Finley Park (tap water) had the highest concentration of microplastics at 1.5
particles/L (Figure 3)
• Tap water contained 0.96 ± 0.11 microplastic particles/L (mean ± SE); bottled
water contained 1.74 ± 0.60 particles/L (mean ± SE) (Figure 4)
• Tap water samples contained fibers (black, blue, grey and clear), fragments
(black, green and silver) and one tire wear particle

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Comparison of surface water samples

• The Thomas Newman Boat Ramp (Broad River) had the highest concentration of
microplastics at 89 particles/L (Figure 5)
• Microplastic concentrations at the two boat ramps sites, Thomas Newman and
Lake Murray Boat Club were 7.4 and 3.6 times higher, respectively, than W.
Columbia Riverfront Park, the site with the lowest number of microplastics
• Primary microplastics (microbeads) were present in 60% of the samples. Primary
microplastics are manufactured to be microscopic and had been used in personal
care products like body scrubs and toothpastes. The U.S. Microbead-Free Waters
Act of 2015 banned the sale of personal care products containing microbeads
beginning in July 2018.
• Secondary microplastics (fibers, fragments, foam, and tire wear particles) were
present in 100% of the samples. Secondary microplastics are the result of the
breakdown of larger plastic items.
o Primary microplastics (microbeads) comprised 1.7% of the total
o Secondary microplastics comprised 98.3% of the total
• The most abundant types of microplastics were tire wear particles (71.7% of total
microplastics), fragments (18.1% of total microplastics) and fibers (8.2% of total
microplastics). Silver fragments comprised over half (9.4%) of the total
fragments; nearly half of the fibers collected (3.4%) were blue in color.
Percentage of tire wear particles at each site were:
o Lake Murray Boat Club – 68.6%
o Lake Murray Public Park – 52.1%
o W. Columbia Riverfront Park, Broad River – 37.5%
o Three Rivers Greenway, Broad River – 64.1%
o Thomas Newman Boat Ramp, Broad River – 83.1%
• Two sites were in close proximity to waste water treatment plants (WWTP)
o W. Columbia Riverfront Park, Broad River – located approximately 470
meters downstream of City of W. Columbia WWTP outfall pipe and
approximately 915 meters downstream of Columbia Canal WWTP outfall
pipe
o Thomas Newman Boat Ramp, Broad River – located approximately 500
meters upstream of Cayce WWTP outfall pipe

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 100

90

80
Microplastic particles/L

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

0
Lake Murray Lake Murray W.Columbia Three Rivers Thomas
Boat Club Public Park Riverfront Park- Greenway - Newman Boat
Broad River Broad River Ramp - Broad
River

Figure 5. Microplastic concentrations in surface water samples.

Hot Needle Test

Microplastics from the following municipal tap water sites were tested using the
hot needle test: The SC State House, W. Columbia Riverfront Park, 2210 Wallace Street
and WIS-TV. Of the microplastics tested, 84.6% were confirmed to be plastic.

SUMMARY

Microplastics were found in all the samples tested except the Aquafina and Nestle
Splash brand bottled water. The high abundance of tire wear particles present in the
samples are consistent with data collected from the Charleston Harbor, SC watershed.
Charleston Harbor studies have found that >90% of total microplastics at some locations
were tire wear particles (Gray et al., 2018; Leads, 2018). Tire wear particles are generated
by the interaction of tires with road surfaces. Stormwater runoff transports the particles
that are deposited on or near the road surface to stormwater drainage systems and
surface waters (Wik & Dave, 2009; Sundt et al., 2014). All surface water sample sites were

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located in urbanized areas with lots of vehicular traffic which would contribute to the
high concentration of TWP.
Columbia gets its drinking water from the Broad River Diversion Canal and Lake
Murray. The Broad River collects water from a large portion of northern South Carolina
through the Broad River Basin while Lake Murray receives water from the Saluda River
Basin. Microplastics were found in both drinking water sources. The presence of
microplastics in the tap water samples may be from the source water bodies as not all
microplastics are removed during the treatment process (Pivokonsky, et al., 2018).
A comprehensive study investigating microplastics in bottled water found an
average of 10.4 microplastic particles (>100 μm) per liter of bottled water with fragments
and fibers being the most prevalent morphology (Mason et al.). The present study
contained 1.74 ± 0.60 particles per liter (mean ± SE) in the seven brands tested and
contained both fragments and fibers. Microplastic contamination in bottled water has
been partially linked to the packing and/or bottling process. Polymer analysis was not
conducted in the present study, so microplastics could not be compared with common
plastics used for the bottles or bottle caps.
The high abundance of microplastics at the boat ramp locations is likely due to the
urbanization of the surrounding land and the areas being high use (vehicles/boats and
people), both of which have been positively correlated with microplastic concentrations
(Yonkos et al., 2014; Yu et al., 2018). The Thomas Newman Boat Ramp is also located in
close proximity to a WWTP. WWTP are known point sources of microplastics to rivers
(Kay et al., 2018). Microplastic concentration in effluent varies by site and treatment
process but averages between 1-30 microplastic particles/L (Conley, 2018). Interestingly,
West Columbia Riverfront Park which is located downstream of two WWTPs had the
lowest concentration of microplastics in the surface water samples. The removal
efficiency of microplastics depends on the type of treatment processes used and may be
a factor in why the West Columbia Riverfront Park has lower concentrations despite
being located by two WWTP.

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DISCLAIMER

Due to the limited number of samples analyzed at each location and for each brand of
bottled water, differences in microplastic concentrations should not be considered
statistically significant. A more comprehensive study analyzing multiple samples per
location (or brand of bottled water) would need to be conducted in order to determine if
differences were statistically significant.

REFERENCES
Conley, K. (2018). The removal of microplastics by wastewater treatment plants in
Charleston, SC and a survey of treatment processes. (Thesis, College of
Charleston).

De Witte, B., Devriese, L., Bekaert, K., Hoffman, S., Vandermeersch, G., Cooreman, K.,
& Robbens, J. (2014). Quality assessment of the blue mussel (Mytilus edulis):
Comparison between commercial and wild types. Marine Pollution Bulletin.
85(1): 146-155.

Gray, A.D., Wertz, H., Leads, R.L., Weinstein, J.E. (2018). Microplastic in two South
Carolina Estuaries: Occurrence, distribution, and composition. Marine Pollution
Bulletin. 128: 223-233.

Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC). (1985). Procedure for sampling

the sea surface microlayer.

Kay, P., Hiscoe, R., Moberley, I. (2018) Wastewater treatment plants as a source of
microplastics in river catchments. Environmental Science and Pollution
Research. 25(20): 20264–20267.

Leads, R. (2018). Microplastic debris in Charleston Harbor: Identifying sources and

assessing effects on grass shrimp (Palaemonetes pugio) immune function. (Thesis,
College of Charleston).

Mason, S.A., Welch, V., Neratko, J. Synthetic polymer contamination in bottled water.
State University of New York at Fredonia, Department of Geology &
Environmental Sciences. 17pp.

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Pivokonsky, M., Cermakova, L., Novotna, K., Peer, P., Cajthaml, T., Janda, V. (2018).
Occurrence of microplastics in raw and treated drinking water. Science of The
Total Environment. 643: 1644-1651.

Sundt, P., Schulze, P.E., Syversen, F. (2014). Sources of microplastic pollution to the
environment. Norwegian Environment Agency. 108pp.

Wik, A. & Dave, G. (2009). Occurrence and effects of tire wear particles in the
environment –A critical review and an initial risk assessment. Environmental
Pollution. 157: 1–11.

Yonkos, L. T., Friedel, E. A., Perez-Reyes, A. C., Ghosal, S., & Arthur, C. D. (2014).
Microplastics in four estuarine rivers in the Chesapeake Bay, USA.
Environmental Science & Technology. 48(24): 4195-14202.

Yu, X., Ladewig, S., Bao, S., Toline, C. A., Whitmire, S., & Chow, A. T. (2018).
Occurrence and distribution of microplastics at selected coastal sites along the
southeastern United States. Science of the Total Environment. 613:298-30.

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 Appendix A

Black fiber collected from the SC State House

Black, purple and blue fibers collected from Wallace Street

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Black and blue fibers collected from W. Columbia Riverfront Park

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