This data set presents microplastic (MP) mass loads including tire wear particles (TWP) in spider webs collected from bus stops in a mid-sized German city. Spider webs were used as a spatial and temporal mirror of MP contamination in urban air. The analysis was conducted with pyrolysis-gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (Py-GC/MS). Details concerning the measurements, quantification, and calibration are found in the related study (Goßmann et al., 2022). Spider webs were greatly contaminated with TWP, clusters of polyethylene-terephthalate (C-PET) and polyvinylchloride (C-PVC). Moreover, they provide insight into spatial differences and trends of MP/TWP load in local (urban) air on a small scale. While busy, stop and go dominated roads showed higher contamination of TWP, spider webs from residential areas were more often contaminated with MP other than TWP, predominantly C-PET. In some spider webs, MP accounted for up to ten percent of the total weight of the sample.
This data set provides quantitative mass loads of tire wear particles (TWP) and traditional microplastics (C-PE, C-PP, C-PS, C-PVC, C-PMMA, C-PET, C-PC, C-MDI-PUR) in the urban environment. A differentiation between car and truck tire wear (CTT and TTT) was presented. The C-PVC cluster might be interfered by additional anthropogenic sources, as the C-PVC indicator naphthalene is highly unspecific, accordingly the given results primarily reflect the order of magnitude. In this study, road dusts were analyzed and measured with pyrolysis-gas chromatography-mass spectronomy (Py-GC/MS). Pyrolysis was performed at 590°C in a micro-furnace pyrolizer (EGA/Py-3030D, FrontierLabs) connected to an auto-shot sampler (AS-1020E, FrontierLabs). A gas chromatograph (6890 N, Agilent) equipped with a DB-5MS column was used for separation. The mass spectrometer (MSD 5973, Agilent) operated with full-scan mode. A gas chromatograph (6890 N, Agilent) equipped with a DB-5MS column was used for separation. The mass spectrometer (MSD 5977A) operated with full-scan mode. Additional information are found in the supplementary information of the related study. Road dust samples were collected in a mid-sized German city (Oldenburg). Road dust were contaminated with traditional microplastics and tire wear particles. The here presented data are part of a study, which has been published in February 2021 (doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.145667).