Application of Phycoremediation Technology in the Treatment of Wastewater from a Leather-Processing Chemical Manufacturing Facility

Application of phycoremediation technology in the

treatment of wastewater from a leather-processing

chemical manufacturing facility

P Hanumantha Rao*, R Ranjith Kumar, BG Raghavan, VV Subramanian and V Sivasubramanian

Department of Plant Biology and Plant Biotechnology, R.K.M. Vivekananda College, Chennai 600 004, Tamil Nadu, India

Abstract

Phycoremediation is the use of algae for the removal or biotransformation of pollutants from wastewater. Employing this

technology in the treatment of industrial effluents presents an alternative to the current practice of using conventional methods, including physical and chemical methods. In the present study, the effluent from a leather-processing chemical manufacturing facility, situated at Ranipet, Tamil Nadu, India, was treated using the microalga, Chlorella vulgaris, which was

isolated from the effluent itself. The objective of this study was to treat the effluent as well as ETP (effluent treatment plant)

solid waste by phycoremediation (pilot-scale field study as well as laboratory study) and to analyse the physico-chemical

parameters before and after treatment. The results obtained showed that Chlorella vulgaris exhibited appreciable nutrient

scavenging properties under both laboratory and field conditions, although phycoremediation carried out in sunlight (field

study) gave better results. Moreover, the growth of Chlorella vulgaris was faster under field conditions.

Keywords: Phycoremediation, microalgae, Chlorella vulgaris, effluent, ETP solid

* To whom all correspondence should be addressed.

 +91 9841910222; e-mail: dr.phrao@gmail.com

Received 23 April 2010; accepted in revised form 13 December 2010.

municipal wastewater in facultative or aerobic ponds (Aziz

and Ng, 1993; Mara and Pearson, 1986; Oswald, 1995). They

have been used for removing nitrogen and phosphorus from

wastewater (Oswald, 1988) and have the potential to be used to

remove various pollutants, including oxides of nitrogen (NOx)

(Nagase et al.,...