The City of Indianapolis has recently been dealing with EPA lead remediation in an East Side neighborhood. Lead is the highest health risk facing the children of Indiana, and especially the children of Marion County. Understanding what lead is, and where it occurs is highly important in order to properly and effectively remediate it. Phytoremediation is a green technique that is “gentle” to the environment and is more accepted by the public. The project was aimed at the remediation of soil to decrease lead concentration to levels acceptable for agricultural use. Lead is not usually accumulated in fruit parts of plants (tomatoes, strawberries, apples). The higher uptake was found in leafy vegetables such as lettuce, and spinach, and on the surface of root crops, such as carrots. Due to the different communities based on nationality in Indianapolis, various species of vegetables were planted to find possible accumulation in vegetable species. The assessment of lead accumulation would be released to citizens advising what kinds of vegetables are/are not safe to eat (no accumulation appears in the edible part of vegetables) and how the garden should be set up.  Plants growing at a contaminated site will be considered potential tools for the phytoremediation process. The samples of soil will be taken from contaminated residential areas. The concentration of lead was measured by AAS from soil samples. The forms of lead were determined to assess the bioavailability of metal to the plants. The concentration of lead was measured in the plants.

Lead remediation from soil by phytoremediation

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