Tag Archives: #Pentortoise Projects

As we approach the need to advance our recov­ery plans and reme­di­a­tion of infected lands, here are a few sound solu­tions to stim­u­late growth within the Recov­ery projects scheme. The team has put together some mod­els for future use of the famed Green­wich Mohawk Brownfield.

From the very start, sus­tain­abil­ity has played a major role in the devel­op­ment of Pen­tor­toise Projects from a social, eco­log­i­cal and eco­nomic viewpoint.

The coöper­a­tive plan­ning process, work­ing closely together with local res­i­dents, envi­ron­men­tal asso­ci­a­tions, her­itage pro­tec­tion, tourism organ­i­sa­tions and local and can­tonal author­i­ties, forms the solid basis for Pen­tor­toise Projects.

We have also opened the chan­nels of com­mu­ni­ca­tion with lead­ers in nat­ural bio-remediation, which we con­sider inno­v­a­tive and with the wake of the gulf oil spill there has been abun­dant prac­tice with much suc­cess. Our mis­sion is to stay 100% away from chem­i­cal clean­ers chem­i­cal soil washing.

How­ever this may be a slow process, but it would be the safest way to extract the heavy met­als and oils by earth­worms, mush­room cul­tures and fast grow­ing veg­e­ta­tion to draw up the toxic remnants.

Teams of researchers in Venezuela and Argentina are on the verge of ele­vat­ing the lowly earth­worm to rock­star sta­tus when it comes to clean­ing up haz­ardous mate­ri­als. They are study­ing the abil­ity of earth­worms to reme­di­ate soil con­tain­ing lead, mer­cury, and other con­t­a­m­i­nants, and so far the worms seem to be get­ting the job done, by eat­ing as much as 7–30 times their body mass in one day.

Worms and Green Remediation

Worms are basi­cally a diges­tive sys­tem that can move about on its own, and humankind has long exploited their capac­ity for trans­form­ing organic mat­ter into rich, nutrient-laden soil through the prac­tice of ver­mi­cul­ture or more domes­ticly known as the com­puter. More recently, at least agri­cul­tural oper­a­tions have begun to adopt ver­mi­cul­ture specif­i­cally to pre­vent piles of rot­ting food waste from con­t­a­m­i­nat­ing nearby water­ways. This comes close to green reme­di­a­tion, which is the use of alter­na­tive tech­niques to clean up con­t­a­m­i­nated soil or water, rather than dig­ging out the site, cap­ping it off, or treat­ing it with harsh chemicals.

Worms and Heavy Metals

The new research takes it a step beyond, by using worms to clean up met­als and other toxic chem­i­cals. One team used worm-produced soil (ver­mi­com­post) to absorb con­t­a­m­i­nated waste-water that con­tained nickel, chromium, vana­dium, and lead. The other team used a more direct method, set­ting the earth­worms loose on soil con­t­a­m­i­nated with arsenic and mer­cury. In both cases, the worms removed a sig­nif­i­cant amount of the tox­ins, par­tic­u­larly in the case of arsenic.

Another Tool for Green Remediation

The green reme­di­a­tion work­force is expand­ing rapidly. Along with worms, microbes are being recruited into the field. New research is yield­ing other exotic approaches, like “swelling glass” that can soak up pol­lu­tants like a sponge, and “hot bub­bles” of pres­sur­ized ozone gas that break down pol­lu­tants.  Mean­while, the energy needed to run pumps, treat­ment plants and other reme­di­a­tion equip­ment is also get­ting greener, as solar power and other forms of alter­na­tive energy are being adopted for site cleanup.

In 1881 Dar­win wrote: “It may be doubted whether there are many other ani­mals which have played so impor­tant a part in the his­tory of the world, as have these lowly orga­nized creatures.”

http://mpegmedia.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/2008/11/ssw_20081115_1208.mp3