Affiliation:
1. College of Environmental Science and Engineering, Dalian Maritime University, Dalian 116026, China
Abstract
Both oil spill and microplastics (MPs) are major issues in marine environments. After a spill, the oil film may disperse into the water column as droplets under the function of sea waves. The oil dispersion may be affected due to the attachment of oil to MPs. In this paper, the impacts of salinity and temperature on the dispersion of spilled oil in the presence of MPs were individually studied by batch conical flask oscillation experiments. The results indicated that the rise in salinity or temperature displayed a more significant effect on promoting, rather than inhibiting, oil dispersion with MPs. When the salinity rose from 15% to 35%, the oil dispersion efficiency (ODE) with the 13 μm polyethylene (PE) and polystyrene (PS) MPs was increased by 10.4% and 12.9%, respectively; when the temperature rose from 10 °C to 25 °C, the corresponding ODE was increased by 15.6% and 12.7%, respectively. In addition, the volumetric mean diameter (VMD) of the dispersed oil droplets decreased with an increase in salinity or temperature. Furthermore, the 13 μm MPs showed a higher impact on the oil dispersion than 106 μm of MPs, and the ODE with PE MPs was greater than that with PS MPs. The findings of this study expanded the understanding of the migration of spilled oil in seawater in the presence of MPs and may further improve the capability of predicting the impact of oil spills by marine environment managers.
Funder
National Natural Science Foundation of China
Liaoning Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China
Subject
Ocean Engineering,Water Science and Technology,Civil and Structural Engineering
Cited by
1 articles.
订阅此论文施引文献
订阅此论文施引文献,注册后可以免费订阅5篇论文的施引文献,订阅后可以查看论文全部施引文献