WC137 JulyAug 2024 - Magazine - Page 17
WASTEWATER
Removing Nanoplastics in
Wastewater with a Circular Approach
How a University of Waterloo researcher and his team removed
nanoplastics from wastewater with 94 per cent efficiency in a
way that promotes a circular economy.
BY AMANDA SCHRACK
S
OLVING THE CHALLENGES of plastic
waste requires both reactive and proactive
approaches. Being reactive means solving
for existing waste, while being proactive
helps mitigate future waste.
For a material that revolutionized our standard
of living, plastic now presents a world of unknowns just 70 years since it was first popularized.
With only about 10 per cent of plastics recycled,
the lifecycle of plastic waste has been left to its
own devices in landfills and water bodies.
This has led to findings of microplastics, or
small pieces of plastic that are 1–1000 m in
size, in water bodies around the globe. Their even
smaller counterparts called nanoplastics, just
0.001–1 m in size, have now been found close to
home—in our drinking water.
Amanda Schrack
is a freelance writer from British Columbia
who is passionate about learning and
sharing the mysteries of the environment.
The reason for concern stems from the harsh
chemicals they’re made from, the toxic pollutants
that stick to them, and how consumable they are.
But what we don’t know is how this impacts the
health of our ecosystems, the food we eat, or how
our bodies will handle this kind of exposure.
Tizazu Mekonnen, associate professor in the
Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of Waterloo and Canada Research Chair
in Sustainable Multiphase Polymers, has studied
plastics from various perspectives. As a result, he’s
led his team to a solution that addresses two issues
at once: recycling the non-recyclable and nanoplastic waste capture in water.
“My research has always focused on sustainable
polymer systems. Making them biodegradable,
compostable, or reducing the carbon footprint of
plastic production by using nature-derived raw
materials,” said Mekonnen.
Some could say that’s a proactive approach
to plastic. By changing the approach to plastic
production, waste is prevented down the line.
“More recently I’ve been very interested in
WATER C AN ADA • JULY/AUGUS T 2024
17
