Sustainable development goals (SDGs), notably SDG 6, emphasize the need to preserve clean and sustainable water resources for the well-being of current and future generations. Natural water resources, such as lakes, rivers, oceans, and groundwater, play a vital role in sustaining the delicate ecosystems that facilitate life on our planet. Since the presence of contaminants such as heavy metals, agricultural runoff, emergent organic compounds, microplastics (MPs), and microbiological pollutants in the aquatic environment deteriorate the quality of the natural water systems, the progress toward the achievement of SDGs gets challenging and complex. These above stated contaminants follow diverse pathways, including stormwater runoff, agricultural runoff, effluent discharges, and the natural weathering of sediments and solid wastes. The concentration of these contaminants detected in the environment varies largely depending on various factors, such as land use or season, which further add to the difficulties and hence requires proper detection and management strategies. Certain pollutants, such as MPs, are at a very preliminary stage of investigation and their proper detection techniques and classification is the need of the hour. Various mitigation techniques have been explored till date among which many techniques have proved to be beneficial. However, to ensure proper mitigation of contaminants and protection of our valuable natural water resources, integrated efforts of researchers, policy makers, and the community is necessary. Hence, further reinvestigations are required to come up with scalable and economically viable mitigation techniques that will not only focus on contaminant removal but also on reusability of wastewater or resources, which is consistent with the larger goal of promoting sustainability in water resource management. © 2024 Elsevier Inc. All rights are reserved including those for text and data mining AI training and similar technologies.
