Abstract

The increase in industrial and artisanal mining and mineral processing activities has led to a surge in the quantity of hazardous materials, typically heavy metals that are released into the environment. These hazard materials, when discharge in water bodies, poses serious risk to humans, animals and environment. Phytoremediation is one of the cost effective methods use in the removal of these pollutants from environment. Several plants have been investigated for their phytoremediating potentials. In this paper, the phytoremediation potential of algae, water hyacinth and water lettuce for the removal of Ni, Pb, and Mn was demonstrated. Plants of equal size were grown in aqueous medium and supplemented with different concentration (1.0 mg/dm<sup>3</sup>, 3.0 mg/dm<sup>3</sup> and 5.0 mg/dm<sup>3</sup>) of multi component metal solution for 15 consecutive days. All the plants revealed a very good accumulation potential, with the accumulation of metals shown to increase with an increase in the initial concentration of the metal solution. At all levels, the plants accumulated the metals more in the root than in shoot except for Mn in water hyacinth. The result showed that water hyacinth was able to accumulate Pb better, while water lettuce showed more preference for Ni and Mn. All the three plants can be used in remediating waste water. Hence, water hyacinth, water lettuce and algae are a promising biomass for phytoremediation.

Highlights

  • Pollution of the aquatic environment by heavy metals is one of the major threats to the water resources of the world today

  • Contamination of aquatic environment can be linked to the increase in the anthropogenic activities, which led to generation of tonnes of wastes into aquatic environment, soil, or emitted into the air [4]

  • The result of heavy metal (Ni, Mn and Pb) analysis in different parts of plants under investigation in a multi component metal solution is summarised in Table 1 and represented in Figures 1 to 3

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Summary

Introduction

Pollution of the aquatic environment by heavy metals is one of the major threats to the water resources of the world today. Heavy metals pollutants are of concern due to the nondegradability hazard they creates (under natural conditions) when discharged into a water body and the serious health complications attributed to them [1,2,3]. The disease claimed the lives of nearly 900 people in Japan and more than 2 million were reported to have suffered from different health complications. The contamination of aquatic ecosystems by heavy metals may result from weathering of soil and rocks from volcanic eruptions [5], or from natural soils due to the changes in local redox conditions and the corrosion of subsurface engineering structures due to prolonged submergence under acidic groundwater. Okafor et al, (2007) and Mohiuddin, et al, (2010) reported that, trace elements may be immobilised within the stream sediments and could be involved in absorption, co-precipitation, Sani Nasiru Alhaji et al.: Phytoremediation of Nickel, Lead and Manganese in Simulated Waste Water Using

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