Mapa dotacji

Contamination of soil represents a growing challenge across the world. In Sweden the government has identified 25,000 areas of contaminated soil that are listed in national and regional databases and in Poland and Lithuania areas of soil contaminated by heavy metals, fertilizers and other chemical pollutants are probably as abundant. The most common methods for cleansing soil are the removal and depositing of top soil from contaminated areas and the cleansing of soil by chemical methods. At the same time, these crops can play an important role in local energy production as they can be used as fuel once they have serverd their purpose with regards to cleaning the soil. This is what our project Baltic Phytoremediation (BAPR) aims to do. Phytoremediation is a new and promising method with a number of advantages. It has been tested, but it is still in the early stages of development. It has the potential to become an established method for the recovery of contaminated soil. It is based on the growing of plants that take up the pollutants and store it in their biomass. The plants are then harvested and the pollutants are easily and inexpensively removed with the plants and they can, for example, be used for the production of biogas. When valuable metals are involved the metals may even be recovered and re-used. Through the method the natural properties of the topsoil are preserved. Organisms that occur naturally in the soil are utilised in the cultivation process and the natural environment is maintained. The process can continue for a number of years and the area can provide biomass to be used for biogas production or incineration in combined heat and power plants. Phytoremediation also provides a visually attractive area during the remediation process. The main outputs of the project will be three installed pilot cases as well as the creation of a Baltic Phytoremediation guidelines to promote the methodology of BAPR.