Organochlorine pesticides remediation techniques: Technological perspective and opportunities

Abstract

Organochlorine pesticides have been widely used in agriculture to control agricultural pests. Although effective in controlling pests, organochlorine pesticides present numerous hazards to ecosystems and human health due to their persistence in the environment, bioaccumulation, and toxicity. Scientific studies have shown that organochlorines may be associated with endocrine and neurological problems. Several strategies have been developed to apply treatment techniques to remove pesticides from various ecosystems, both aquatic and terrestrial. Physicochemical and biological methods have revealed other potentialities for remediation of aqueous environments contaminated with organochlorine pesticides. In addition, combined processes using different approaches have been highlighted as efficient alternatives to mitigate the impacts of agrochemicals on the environment, e.g., physical technique followed by a biological process. However, there are still numerous gaps that need to be explored and elucidated. Therefore, this review addressed the impacts of organochlorine pesticides on ecosystems and some treatment techniques used to remove agrochemicals from water. Furthermore, new findings, technological perspectives, and opportunities on this subject were presented and discussed.

Keywords

• Emerging contaminants
• Agrochemicals
• Ecotoxicological impacts
• Physical-chemical techniques
• Bioremediation