Many organic pollutants, such as oil, pollute soil. Traditional option to clean soil polluted with organic pollutants is to treat soil by composting, and though this is rather successful in dealing with oil, it is far less effective when put against other organic pollutants.
The researchers have estimated that soil polluted with organic pollutants different than oil accounts for as much as 45% of excavated contaminated soil, and thus finding the effective cleaning solution for this soil is very important.
The latest study conducted by Finish scientists showed that this soil which is usually found in areas with plenty of sawing or with significant distribution of fuels, waste treatment and various kinds of industry, can be successfully cleaned with fungi.
Taking soil to a landfill is anything but a sustainable practice. In fact, a lot more sustainable solution would be to clean the polluted soil with fungi instead. However, many countries choose the landfill option because this is cheap and easy to do.
Fungi such as mycellium break down soil polluting substances very successfully. The laboratory tests showed efficiency higher than 90% in breaking down soil-polluting compounds.
As already stated above, landfills are still the No.1 option but in years to come new methods will be necessary such as this one that involves using fungi.
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