Remediation of Organic Pollutants in Water

Abstract

In the past few decades, there has been an increase in the production of organic chemicals for their utilization in the fields, such as agriculture, pharma, flame retardants, and personal care products. Many of them are characterized as pollutants due their harmful effects on humans and the environment. Even today, adequate methods are not matured enough to prevent their release from industry into the environment. This is a serious challenge in front of the global community, and the responsibility to save the environment and humans from these hazardous chemicals is enormous. Organic pollutants accumulated into the human body generally lead to various types of carcinogenic effects. So, it is necessary to understand the flow cycle of these pollutants in the environment to save ourselves. In this regard, the first part of the chapter focuses on the various sources of organic pollutants, their transport process, and their impact on human health.The second part of the chapter explores the recent possible solutions reported for removing these organic pollutants from the water. The treatment methods are selected based on their performance efficiency and their feasibility in employing them as remediation technology. The major treatment methods covered in this chapter are adsorption, photocatalytic process, advanced oxidation process, electrochemical methods, and bioremediation. Adsorption using carbon nanospheres are reported with 100% removal efficiency. All the photocatalytic materials covered in this chapter possesses degradation efficiency above 91% for the degradation of organic dyes.The bioremediation section details the various species of microorganism reported for the degradation of pesticides in the water. Finally, the technological gaps existing in this field to be addressed in near future are highlighted.KeywordsOrganic PollutantsWaterEnvironmentRemediationHealthHarmful Effects, Hazardous Chemicals, Human HealthAdsorptionBioremediation