ABSTRACT
9The discharge of non-treated heavy metal laden wastewater from various process industries have shown to cause detrimental effects on the environment and human health. Metal contamination in environment can be found in various forms, either as gaseous or solid or liquid phase discharge. On the other hand, metal resource depletion has also accelerated due to the advancement in technologies which consumes large amount of raw materials. Recent research topics in this field have focused on the recovery of metals from contaminated waste streams. Therefore, there are many researchers starting to focus on recovery metals from the waste streams. Currently, there are many treatment technologies for the removal and recovery of heavy metals. These technologies have their own advantages and limitations. However, ecological friendly technologies appear to have gained more attention and interest for sustainable development. The examples of these technologies are adsorption, biological sulfide precipitation and phytoremediation which utilize the inherent capability of microorganisms to treat metals under neutral conditions and produce less toxic and easily manageable end-products. These technologies have been reviewed and discussed in this chapter.
