Nanotechnology and in Situ Remediation: A Review of the Benefits and Potential Risks

By B. Karn, T. Kuiken, M. Otto. Environmental Health Perspectives, 2009

635 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Objective Although industrial sectors involving semiconductors; memory and storage technologies; display, optical, and photonic technologies; energy; biotechnology; and health care produce the most products that contain nanomaterials, nanotechnology is also used as an environmental technology to protect the environment through pollution prevention, treatment, and cleanup. In this review, we focus on environmental cleanup and provide a background and overview of current practice; research findings; societal issues; potential environment, health, and safety implications; and future directions for nanoremediation. We do not present an exhaustive review of chemistry/engineering methods of the technology but rather an introduction and summary of the applications of nanotechnology in remediation. We also discuss nanoscale zerovalent iron in detail. Data sources We searched the Web of Science for research studies and accessed recent publicly available reports from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and other agencies and organizations that addressed the applications and implications associated with nanoremediation techniques. We also conducted personal interviews with practitioners about specific site remediations. Data synthesis We aggregated information from 45 sites, a representative portion of the total projects under way, to show nanomaterials used, types of pollutants addressed, and organizations responsible for each site. Conclusions Nanoremediation has the potential not only to reduce the overall costs of cleaning up large-scale contaminated sites but also to reduce cleanup time, eliminate the need for treatment and disposal of contaminated soil, and reduce some contaminant concentrations to near zero—all in situ. Proper evaluation of nanoremediation, particularly full-scale ecosystem-wide studies, needs to be conducted to prevent any potential adverse environmental impacts.

Subfields: Biomedical Engineering, Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Materials Chemistry

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/67415d2380046c70094b5cda4e759548c97966a9

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Citations in the corpus

Nanotechnology in sustainable agriculture: Present concerns and future aspects (2014, background): “A variety of nanoparticle filters have been used in remediation of waste sites in developed countries (Karn et al., 2009).”
Engineered nanomaterials for water treatment and remediation: Costs, benefits, and applicability (2016, background): “Although there are several types, the Me/MeO ENMs most-commonly applied for water treatment/environmental remediation are nanoscale zero-valent iron (nZVI) [17,18,39], TiO2 [40– 44], Ag [11,15,44–47], and ZnO [48,49].”
Nanoscale zero valent iron and bimetallic particles for contaminated site remediation (2013, background): “According to a recent report published by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences there have been 44 sites worldwide where nano-materials have been injected into the subsurface for remediation purposes [213].”
Assessing the colloidal properties of engineered nanoparticles in water: case studies from fullerene C60 nanoparticles and carbon nanotubes (2010, methodology): “In either case, interparticle repulsion is increased and dispersion properties are improved.[14,19] Surface modification techniques are also used to deliberately modify other properties (e.”