Action 42: Sewage and storm water related waste entering the marine environment
Action Title: Investigate and promote with appropriate industries the use of Best Available Techniques (BAT) and Best Environmental Practice (BEP) to develop sustainable and cost effective solutions to reducing and preventing sewage and storm water related waste entering the marine environment, including micro particles.
Lead Party(ies): Ireland, Norway and Sweden
What is the issue?
Wastewater from industries and households can contain substantial amounts of microplastics. Microplastics are classified as either primary or secondary. Primary microplastics are intentionally engineered and added to products or used in production processes, whilst secondary microplastics are created intentionally or unintentionally during the production, use or waste phase of plastic items (specifically the degradation of plastic items over time). Microplastics in wastewater and stormwater can originate from industrial processes, cleaning products, textiles etc. Current studies indicate that the greatest contribution, however, may come from roads and paved surfaces in urban areas.
What has OSPAR Done?
The work undertaken to address this action has mainly focused on micro litter, and especially on micro plastics. Due to the broad scope of this action, the task leads initially focused on microlitter, as macrolitter would be, in part, addressed by many other actions of the OSPAR RAP ML. OSPAR Contracting Parties developed four documents that comprise the outputs for this collective action.
Final outputs and published reports
ACTION COMPLETED
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Report concerning techniques to reduce litter in waste water and storm water
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Technical report on technologies for litter reduction from waste- and storm water and supply
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Background document on BAT/BEP in urban wastewater treatment systems, with a focus on stormwater related litter in particular microplastics was published in 2019.
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Synthesis of responses to a questionnaire on storm water systems.
