ABSTRACT
Water hyacinth [Eichhornia crassipes (Mart) Solms] is a large floating aquatic plant naturally existing in tropical and subtropical climates, but can adapt to temperate climates very well. Application of water hyacinth as a biological agent for phytoremediation has been practiced not only in ponds, harbors, small bays and lagoons, but also in large lakes and reservoirs to purify water in ecological engineering projects. Water hyacinth has desired capabilities for remediation of water bodies, but only a few large scale applications have been put to practice due to ecological risks to biodiversity in aquatic ecosystems and high costs of harvest and disposal of huge amounts of fresh biomass. Using water hyacinth for large scale phytoremediation to control eutrophication implies that the population of water hyacinth (regardless of whether naturally present or introduced) needs to be controlled at a given location. This chapter focuses on two case studies on phytoremediation conducted in Lake Dianchi and Lake Taihu.
