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Polluted Lakes Are Being Cleansed Using Floating Wetlands Made of Trash

Platforms combining plants and recycled garbage could offer a cut-price solution for reviving polluted bodies of water.

It has spent around five years building, testing, and implementing the first known trash-based wetland water-cleaning systems here in Nagdaha’s polluted waters, which contain high concentrations of nitrates and phosphates due to agricultural and urban runoff. However, Pradhanang emphasizes that the floating treatment systems are only providing a net good if they are maintained properly; if people don’t take care of them, there’s the risk their components become unfastened and turn back into trash. But to give them staying power once the researchers leave, “we have to demonstrate the effectiveness of these systems,” explains Dr. Ritu Singh, an assistant professor at the Central University of Rajasthan and the FTWS collaboration’s lead for India.

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