Bioremediation is a new green economic approach in providing solutions for cleaning up
contaminated sites. Phytoremediation uses plants as a tool for remediation purposes. The usage
of plant species offers higher potential solution to remediate heavy metal contaminated sites.
This study aimed on screening potential plant species for phytoremediation of heavy metal
contaminated water. The potential of three aquatic macrophytes species (Eichorrnia crassipes,
Pistia stratiotes and Ipomoea aquatica) for chromium and nickel phytoremediations was tested.
The plants were exposed for 10 days under hydroponic conditions in heavy metal contaminated
water. E. crassipes showed the highest chromium and nickel concentrations in its biomass, 1.60
and 2.40 μg/L respectively. Meanwhile, P. stratiotes had chromium and nickel concentrations
detected at 0.89 and 0.081 μg/L, respectively; chromium and nickel concentrations of I.
aquatica detected were, 0.49 and 0.08 μg/L, respectively. The ability of these plants to
accumulate heavy metals and survived throughout the experiment demonstrates the potential of
these plants to remediate metal-enriched water. Among the three tested aquatic plants, E.
crassipes was proven to be the most suitable plant species that can phytoremediate heavy metal
contaminated water followed by P. stratiotes and I. aquatica.