PHYTOREMEDIATION

Today's Elmira Independent (pg. 4) has an article by Dianne Saxe, an environmental lawyer regarding using plants and trees to clean up contaminated soil or groundwater. This methodology was presented to CPAC about a year ago and although there are scenarios where it could be very helpful, the Chemtura site in my opinion is not one of them. Ms. Saxe's article is very well done and well balanced in that it clearly gives both the pros and cons of this remediation methodology. To my mind one of the big cons is that the plants and trees do very little chemical breakdown and are mostly uptaking the chemicals through their roots and storing them in the trunk, branches and leaves. Therefore eventually you still have to deal with the contaminants, one way or the other. I will include a link to this story when it comes online.