Bacteria 'can purify toxic water'

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Researchers claim to have shown for the first time that naturally occurring bacteria can help purify toxic water.

A team at the University of New South Wales has shown it can safely destroy industrial toxins in groundwater arising from PVC plastic production by injecting naturally occurring bacteria into a contaminated aquifer in Sydney.

The trial has confirmed the bacteria's natural ability to degrade and clean up chlorinated solvents that leaked many years ago from a former chemical plant into the Botany Sands Aquifer, creating large plumes of contaminated groundwater.

"With present technology, it was expected that it might take decades or perhaps centuries before these toxic solvents are removed from the aquifer," Prof Mike Manefield, who led the team, said. He added: "The energy demands and hence the financial burden of operating the contaminant containment system over this period of time is significant, but with our cultures in the ground we have the potential to greatly reduce the cleanup time and the cost and environmental footprint of containment. "Our tests showed that these bacteria effectively breathe these pollutants the way we breathe oxygen.

It's a big step forward. These cultures represent a greener and cheaper tool we can use to clean up some of our contaminated sites. They have not previously been available in Australia."