9 Emerging Contaminants

Climate Action, Life on Land, Life below Sea,

Differentiate contaminants and pollutant

contaminant = any physical, chemical, biological or radiological substance in environments which are not natural and don’t necessarily cause harm

pollutant = contaminant which cause adverse biological, chemical or physics effects to organisms or environments

Identify and classify a range of emerging environmental contaminants and pollutants

Plastics (macro and micro)

• widespread, persistent and fragmenting microplastice

• recycling is imperfect

  • euqire waste reduction, improved recycling and collection efforts

• nature-based innovations like PETase and mussel filtration

Fertilisers

• cause eutrophrophication

Why are pollutants and contaminants are of environmetal concern

PFAs (Forever Chemicals)

• synthetic, highly mobile, and resistant to degradation

• strong evidence of human and environmental harm

  • bioaccumulare across ecosystems

• urgent need for capture technologies, destruction methods and nature-based attentuation

Evaluate current remediation approaches and identify their key limitations and challenges

mussels

• naturally filter microplastic

• concentrate plastic for easier removal

• low energy, scalable

• cobenefits for biodiversity

stopping production of outdoor gear utilising goretex

• very expensive

• pioneer by patagonia

• goretex useful for its waterproof abilities