Source: Comis, Don. 1996. Green remediation: using plants to clean the soil. J. Soil Water Conserv. 51:184-187.

Agronomists are developing a process called green remediation in which they use plants to remove toxic heavy metals from contaminated soils. Soil pollutants found in smelter and mining sites, landfills, and nuclear waste dumps are removed by metal scavenging plants called hyperaccumulators. Hyperaccumulator plants increase sustainability by restoring the health and usefulness of the soil. But ideal plants with fast rates of metal intake have not yet been found, and progress in breeding such plants is slow. According to the author, however, the benefits of hyperaccumulation greatly supersede the problems because (1) toxic metals are easily removed by harvesting the accumulator plants, (2) the cost of using such plants is relatively inexpensive, and (3) heavy metals in the plants could be extracted and sold to offset costs. Plants effective at storing zinc, cadmium, and nickel will undoubtedly be used in the next decade. However, the slow rate of lead uptake has no foreseeable solution. To increase the rate of heavy metal uptake, microbiologists have used two methods: (1) They either remove the fungi that hinder plant uptake or, (2) they breed plants with more uptake. Comis concludes that further research in breeding and green remediation will lead to preference for this approach in the removal of all toxic heavy metals from the soils. Green remediation is identified as the only sustainable answer for correcting widespread soil contamination in the coming decades.

Abstract Author: Arin Lisa Kramer, 8 November 1997.

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