Environmental friendly technologies for remediation of toxic heavy metals : pragmatic approaches for environmental management

• Contamination of different environmental matrices (air, soil, and water) by toxic heavy metals is a widespread problem that disturbs the environment as an outcome of many anthropocentric practices. Heavy metals exceeding the permissible limits exert deleterious impacts on human beings, causing life-threatening health manifestations and detrimental effects on the environment. This has alarmed the dire need to explore various modern remediation techniques that can be utilized to lower excessive concentrations. Owing to their high-cost effectiveness, unsatisfactory output, environmentally unfriendly, complicated procedure, and high operational costs, these technologies failed to find any practical utility in remediation. On the other hand, plants and associated microorganisms are receiving more consideration as a means of remediating or degrading environmental pollutants. This chapter provides us insights into the various environmental friendly techniques that will improve our environment’s quality. Among which, phytoremediation is considered an effective technique which is known for its esthetic benefits and endless applicability. Furthermore, metal-resistant bacteria (plant growth-promoting rhizobacteria) are also reported to play a pivotal role in the phytoremediation and solubilization of minerals. Thus, this chapter critically reviews the phytoremediation technology and the efficient exploitation of microbes to alleviate the environmental burden of toxic heavy metals.

Subject headings

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Geovetenskap och miljövetenskap -- Miljövetenskap (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Earth and Related Environmental Sciences -- Environmental Sciences (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Contaminants

Heavy metals

Metal-resistant bacteria

Phytoremediation

Remediation

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

kap (subject category)