Chemical Methods of Heavy Metal Management—Filtration, Ion Exchange, and Electrolysis

In the modern industrial era, the number of factors and manufactories is increased rapidly. This development also has many problems, such as environmental remediation, wastewater pollution and heavy metal disruption. A large amount of wastewater was produced from various industrial works. The solubility of heavy metal ions is a large problem for aquatic organisms, zoos, plants and the human body. The presence of heavy metals leads to many chronic and genetic diseases. In this chapter, the chemical methods of heavy metal management, such as filtration, ion exchange and electrolysis, were discussed and viewed with the current examples. The electrodialysis, reverse osmosis, nanofiltration and ultrafiltration methods were also used in the heavy metal removal. The membrane separation technology is one of the green technologies in water recycling and water management because of its cost effectivity, low space requirements, easy operation, high efficiency and good selectivity. The ion exchanges were specially prepared from the polymer type of materials. The ion exchangers contained more neutral ions, such as sodium or calcium. These ions are neutral ions and cannot influence the environment. The electrolysis method is also the next important technique in heavy removal. Microbial electrolysis cells (MECs) are new and more effective methods of electrolysis in heavy metal management. In the microbial electrolysis cells, the organic and inorganic compounds were oxidized and reduced on the cathode and anode.