Environmental Remediation Intergrated with Bioenergy Production: A New Paradigm.

Soil and water pollution becomes a limiting factor for sustainable social and economic development in China, as well as in many parts of the world. In China, about 20-30% of soils have been polluted by heavy metals and/or organic toxicants, and about 60-70% of surface water bodies have been polluted by nitrogen and phosphorus, becoming water eutrophication. Phytoremediation engineering for polluted water and soil environments have been proved to be a promising technology, for its efficiency, low cost, and ecologically sound. In last decade, great advances have been made on principles and techniques of phytoremediation for heavy metal polluted soils, metal and organic co-contaminated soils, and ecological remediation for water eutrophication in lakes, reservoirs and rivers. Special efficient plant germplams have been identified for environmental remediation of heavy metal, nutrients, and some organic toxicants. For polluted agricultural soils, a new technique has been developed of phytoremediation coupled with crop production to secure sustainable agricultural production and food safety. In order to solve the whole problem on large scale it is essential to intergrate the environmental remediation with bioenergy production. Several intergrated technology modes are under development, such as ecological remediation of water eutrophication in drinking water source reservoirs integrated with bio-coal production; phytoremediation of metal polluted agricultural soils integrated with biochars production; ecological remediation of town/village environments and/or animal forms integrated with biogas production. With improvement of bioenergy technologies, environmental remediation intergrated with bioethanol production will become feasible in the near future.