Heavy metals are natural compounded elements occurring in the environment and different in concentrations along the earth crust. Source of these elements in water and soils mainly include natural occurrence derived from parent materials and anthropogenic activities. Pollution by heavy metals is still a serious problem due to their toxicity and ability to accumulate in the biota, and causes various health problems in humans and animals. This paper discussed the effects and sources of heavy metals as well as phytoremediation techniques. Phytoremediation techniques or strategies seem to be a prosperous way to remediate heavy metals-contaminated environment (water, soil air and others. It has some advantage compared with other used or available physical and chemical process or conventional strategies. There are several factors that must be considered in order achieved a high performance of remediation result, and the most crucial factors is a suitable plant species which can be used to uptake the contaminant. Although, phytoremediation techniques seems to be the most efficient, but it has some limitations.

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Present investigation was carried out on groundwater in Unguwa Uku for water quality parameters during October, 2016. Parameters such as total hardness (TH), alkalinity, electrical conductivity (EC), turbidity, pH, temperature, chloride, calcium, free CO 2 , suspended solids (SS), total suspended solids (TSS), total dissolve solids (TDS), colour, and odour were analyzed from five locations. The analysis were carried out using standard analytical methods. The analysis of data reveals that, the value of free CO 2 ranges from 9-104 mg/L, 36.05-72.10 mg/L for Calcium, 2-13 NTU for turbidity, 583.59-2065.03mg/L for total hardness 7.1-8.3 for pH, 21.7-23.4°C for temperature, 202-970 mg/L for TDS, 250-305 mg/L for alkalinity, 405-1939µS/cm for conductivities, 5TCU for colour, 111.70-659.51mg/L for suspended solids, 669.03-1255.51mg/L for total suspended solids, 106.57-296.10mg/L for chloride. The results obtained revealed that, the values of alkalinity, TDS, TSS, SS, pH, temperature, colour, odour, free CO 2 , and concentrations of Calcium of the water samples analyzed are within the acceptable limits set by World Health Organization (WHO) and Nigerian Standards for Drinking Water Quality (NSDWQ) for the drinking water. The values of electrical conductivity and total hardness are above the maximum permissible limits and may have adverse effects on the human health of the study area. However, not all the values of turbidity and chloride in the samples are within the acceptable limits of WHO and NSDWQ in the drinking water. This paper also recommended that, government and non-governmental agencies should make reasonable effort to control, regulate and educate the people in the study area for proper disposal of domestic effluents.