©2013 Scienceweb Publishing
International Journal of Biotechnology and Food Science
Vol. 1(3), pp. 56-64, September 2013
ISSN: 2384-7344
Research Paper
In-situ bioremediation for treatment of sewage flowing
in natural drains
S. K. Jain1 • A. B. Akolkar2 • M. Choudhary2
1
International Institute for Environmental Management and Research, A-7 In Toran Garden, A. B. Rd, Indore-11, India.
2
Central Pollution Control Board, Delhi, India.
Abbreviations: BOD, Biochemical oxygen demand; COD, chemical oxygen demand; TDS, Total dissolved solids; TSS, total
suspended solids; ETP, effluent treatment plant; STP, sewage treatment plant; CFU, colony forming units.
Accepted 21st August, 2013
Abstract. The study is aimed to treat sewage flowing in open drains by application of especially developed microbial
consortium – a bioremediation method. The objective of the study is that sewage may be stabilized in drains thereby
giving relief to the citizens from exposure of obnoxious harmful gases and unhygienic situations which prevail in the
vicinity of open drains, and to reduce concentration of water polluting parameters like biochemical oxygen demand,
chemical oxygen demand, total dissolved solids, total suspended solids including odour control. The study has been
carried out at Indore in Khajarana-RR-A.B. road drain in a stretch of 9.55 km as a model project using probiotics
consortium without changing the basic structure of the drain or flow pattern, with a stress on economic-viability by
adopting non- mechanized/ non-electrical processes so that unskilled staff could carry out the treatment process. A
critical examination of Data for 12 months has shown reductions in odour of more than 98%, BOD of 75 to 80%, and
COD of 70% under natural conditions.
Keywords: In-situ, bioremediation, sewage, natural drain, treatment.
INTRODUCTION
Wherever people live, waste products are produced as a justified from the economic point of view. In so doing,
result of their activities. These can be solid, liquid or particular attention has to be paid to obtain secondary
gaseous and may substantially affect the health either use or recovery or conversion into products which can
directly (e.g. by pathogens, odour nuisance, unaesthetic well be utilized.
appearance, etc) or they may cause major damage to Environmental Acts adopted in various countries in the
natural resources through soil, water and air. world, states that:
Ever since wastes have become trouble-some and man
has tried to dispose them off in natural resources. In the Further development of the National Economy and
past nature disposed off such wastes since the the Management of the National Environment call
population of men was not much and carrying capacity of for towns and villages to effectively utilize or
natural resources was enormous. Now it is vice-versa. harmlessly dispose off waste products and care
Therefore, the problem of pollution has become a great has to be taken that the Living conditions of
dogma. citizens, the landscape and public health are not
In the interest of public hygiene, public health and impaired by waste products.
national economy these wastes, especially the
community sewage, have to be disposed off in a Thus, it is expressly stressed that the necessary facilities
hygienically, unobjectionable way, at costs that are for the efficient reuse and harmless disposal of community
Int. J. Biotechnol. Food Sci. / Jain et al. 57
sewage should be planned and provided. of certain microbes that use contaminants as a source of
In order to improve the demand of water need for both food and energy (EPA, 2012). Kensa (2011) in an article
– industrial sector and domestic, and for the sake of “Bioremediation: an overview”, states that bioremediation
environmental protection, greater importance must be is an ecologically sound and state-of-the-art technique
attached to reutilization of by-products or recovery of that employs natural biological processes to completely
water from wastewater for industrial use during the eliminate toxic contaminants. It may be any process that
treatment of community sewage and / or the revival of uses microorganisms, fungi, green plants or their
polluted water bodies. enzymes to return the natural environment altered by
This study explores the possibility for in-situ treatment contaminants to its original condition.
of polluted water body by eco-friendly technology for By definition, bioremediation is the use of living
cleaning the polluted drain water for various uses, organisms, primarily microorganisms, to degrade the
achieving the UNEP‟s goal and reviving the natural environmental contaminants into less toxic forms, it uses
resource as well. naturally occurring bacteria and fungi or plants (Rani et
al., 2007) to degrade or to detoxify substances hazardous
to human health, aquatic and terrestrial life and/or
Magnitude of the problem environment.
In literature most of the works on Bioremediation is
In 142 class 1 cities in India, there is lack of adequate done in laboratory scale (Monica et al., 2011),
sewage collection and treatment system. Majority of ETPs/STPs (Ahluwalia and Goyal, 2007; Jain, 2006;
cities have no facilities for sewage and treatment of Singh et al., 2010), or land and ground water (Mani and
community sewage. In rural areas, the condition is still Kumar, 2013; Chakraborty et al., 2012; Chatterjee et al.,
worst. 2012; Achal et al., 2012b). Celia and Franklin (1997), in
Due to inadequate sewage disposal, it invariably gets „Bioremediation: Today and Tomorrow‟ have cited 140
mixed with the open/natural water resources leading to references showing its applicability to mines, soil,
water pollution (Death of River/Fresh water Resources) groundwater, organic and metal contaminants, leaching
as is observed at Indore (Death of Khan and Saraswati and engineered bioremediation; but none on sewage
Rivers). drains or polluted rivers. They further state that
It is a universal truth that wherever people live, pollution technologies for surface water remediation are not nearly
is generated. It is mainly generated in the form of as well developed as those for soil or even ground water.
community sewage. This needs a proper treatment and Similar views are expressed in MoEF, Govt. of India
disposal. Such facilities are lacking in the countries like Report (2011) and Mandal et al. (2012).
India, and hence most of the rivers in this country are Now, there is an urgent need to develop techno-
either polluted or even converted into sewage drain, such economical solutions for revival of such dead rivers to
as - Khan and Saraswati rivers at Indore and Mula-Mutha meet growing demands of water and for the survival of
river at Pune. Such conditions of rivers have arisen due mankind in future on this beautiful planet “Our Mother
to discharge of untreated community sewage into rivers Earth”.
which have exceeded the carrying capacity of rivers, or in
other words destroyed the self purification mechanism of
rivers. Technology needs
An improper management of such wastes creates
environmental problems, because it contains large To achieve this goal, the only solution is to treat the
amount of carbohydrates, proteins, fat, mineral salt and community sewage at generation point most techno-
other chemical compounds. The content of high organic economically in a decentralized system, that is, by dosing
matter in the wastewater can be used as a source of eco-friendly microbial population in-situ (Jain 2011).
energy for the growth of microorganisms (Betty and To control the odour in the Nala or drains or channels,
Winiarti, 1990). Contaminated systems are causing especially developed eco-friendly microbes can be dosed
impacts on plants, microorganisms, aquatic organizations in-situ which do not allow the formation of either H 2S
and life support functions, such as immobilisation, (Hydrogen sulphide) or methane – constituents of odour
mineralization and nitrification, that is ultimately affecting and anaerobic putrefaction, instead converts all organic
human health as well as health of ecosystem (Batayneh, matters into carbon dioxide (CO2) through the process of
2012). fermentation. The latter is utilised by photosynthetic
Bioremediation is an option that offers the possibility to organisms present in the consortium. In short,
destroy or render harmless various contaminants using bioremediation technology has thus revolutionized
natural biological activity. As such, it uses relatively low- sewage and wastewater treatment. Probiotics (eco-
cost, low technology techniques which generally have a friendly and efficient microbes) have been used
high public acceptance and can often be carried out at worldwide for more than 10 years in sewage treatment
site (Vidali, 2001). Bioremediation stimulates the growth plants in many countries including USA, Japan, Australia,
58 Int. J. Biotechnol. Food Sci. / Jain et al.
Figure 1. Map showing origin, merging and confluence of Khajarana-Ring Road-A. B. Road Drains with River
Khan.
Thailand, Vietnam, Pakistan, India etc. Its spectacular Bombay road on eastern side of Indore town. Both these
performance in curbing pollution and treatment of effluent natural drainage – meant for carrying storm water; but get
has made it the natural choice for environmentalists, loaded with domestic sewage and thus serve the purpose
municipalities and industry alike (Jain, 2006). of sewage disposal. Since these are passing through the
part of eastern sector of Indore town, carry about 20 MLD
of domestic sewage emanating from 2 to 3 Lakhs
Objective of the research population living in newly developed colonies and old
habitation of town living around these natural drainages
The R&D study proposed is to treat sewage flowing in (Figure 1). Thus this natural drain covers a total of 9.55
open drains by application of biological methods- km distance up to confluence with Khan River. The total
Bioremediation using suitable Microbial Consortium. The catchment / basin of these drains is around 5.4 sq.km
objective of the study is: with a circumference of 16 km resembling almost a
rectangle with little East-West protrusions.
1. To reduce concentration of organic pollutants in water Survey conducted from start point to Agra-Bombay
body and to record an improvement in water quality by road, covering a stretch of 2.6 km, gave an idea of flow of
analysing pollution indicative parameters like BOD, COD, domestic sewage in these drains. At the start point, flow
pH, TDS, TSS and Chlorides. is very little; but further downstream the flow of sewage
2. To observe reduction in odour and reduction of bottom gets increased since more than 10 newly developed
sludge. colonies-Private and Sch. No. 93 and 59 of Indore
3. The study is to be carried out without changing the Development Authority pour domestic sewage in these
basic structure of the drain or flow pattern. (having average population ranging between 6000 to
4. This study is stressed on economic-viability based on 15000 people).
non-mechanized / non-electrical processes so that un- A total of 8 dosing stations (Figure 2) have been
skilled staff could carry out the treatment process. identified to dose the consortium of probiotic population.
These stations (from upstream to downstream of drain)
are: Khajarana, Ring Road, Utkarsh Vihar, Anuragnagar,
MATERIALS AND METHODS Gurudwara, Bhamori Pul, GSITM college-Sukhalia and
Nyaynagar.
Description of the project area The drain water samples have been collected
throughout 12 months covering all the three seasons,
There are mainly two natural drainage crossing Agra- viz.-summer, rainy and winter from Gurudwara, Bhamori,
Int. J. Biotechnol. Food Sci. / Jain et al. 59
Figure 2. Schematic diagram showing dosing points on drains at Indore.
Sukhaliya and 100 m upstream before confluence with collected for the sake of comparison. Samples collected
river Khan. Also, samples from 2 drains - Palasia drain periodically are analysed for various Parameters – BOD,
and raw sewage from Utkarsh vihar drain have been COD, TDS & TSS by Regional Laboratory MPPCB,
60 Int. J. Biotechnol. Food Sci. / Jain et al.
Table 1. Monitoring results of drain water quality (before start of bioremediation).
1 2 3 4 5
Station pH TDS TSS Cl BOD COD
Gurudwara 7.57 879 396 425 320 590
Bhamori 7.79 2217 491 175 290 530
Drain 100 M before confl. into Khan 7.52 815 647 350 410 650
Khan 50 M DS of drain confluence 7.59 814 210 425 210 370
1: Total dissolved solids; 2: Total suspended solids; 3: Chlorides; 4: Biochemical oxygen demand; 5: Chemical oxygen
demand. Date of Sampling: 04/02/2011. Except pH, all values are expressed in mg/L.
Table 2. Monitoring of drain water quality (after start of bioremediation).
Station pH TSS BOD COD
Gurudwara 7.2 355 110 270
Bhamori 7.8 778 105 300
Sukhaliya Pul 7.3 1066 115 320
Drain 100 M before confl. into Khan 7.5 294 70 270
Date of sampling: 25/04/2011 (After 45 Days of Dosing) Bioremediation Stations. Except pH, all
values are expressed in mg/L.
Indore following standard methods as mentioned in carried out through a 90° „V‟ notch near Sukhalia
APHA, AWWA, WEF (2005). (recording about 90% discharge as downstream colonies
are also pouring its sewage in this drain in downstream of
„V‟ notch). A maximum flow of 1400 cum/h during noon
Activation of microbial consortium time and minimum flow of about 700 cum/h is recorded
during early morning hours.
The dormant culture was opened and activated by taking Prior to dosing of the microbial consortium, the drain
1 L of dormant culture, 20 g micronutrients and 49 L of water quality was analyzed in M. P. State Pollution
filtered drain water in a container (in 1:50 ratio) in PVC Control Board‟s Regional Laboratory (Table 1, Figure 3a,
drum. After screwing the cap tightly, it was kept for b, c and d).
activation and multiplication. After 12 h, it was dosed From Table 1, it is evident that the drain is highly
daily. In the start daily dosing was 80 L up to 60 days, polluted and carries almost pure sewage with an
then 60 L for next 3 months and thereafter 40 L. Dosing obnoxious odour spreading in nearby areas.
was done through an e-micro-acti-dozer (mechanical After the dosing of microbial consortium, it was
dosing), through PVC tanks (for gravity dosing) 24 hourly observed that the BOD and COD of this drain decreased
and also by manual spraying through spray pumps twice gradually with a reduction in obnoxious odour. The quality
in 24 h in 3 points. At each dosing point 200 L of of drain water recorded during various months is
activated culture was dosed inclusive of 20 L of manual presented in Tables 2 to 9, Figures 3a, b, c and 4.
spraying. For comparison purpose, the quality of raw sewage and
The source of microbial consortium used in this study is drain not under treatment was recorded in Table 3.
Sevalgen developed by MSI Biotech, India since this Tables 2, 3, and 4 indicate that in-situ bioremediation
consortium was used earlier by Jain (2011) in sewage treatment of drain has positive impacts in controlling the
treatment. EM was also used earlier in sewage treatment odour nuisance and also in the reduction of pollution
(Jain, 2006); but it had limitations. Hence, a consortium load. The BOD has almost reduced by 45% after 6 weeks
containing co-enzymes (oxido-reductase group with of dosing. In general, it was observed that odour was
proteolytic enzymes) and bacterial population belonging reduced in the drain under treatment as compared with
to hydrolytic, photosynthetic, flourscent, Bacillus sp., other drains, viz. Palasia Drain on A. B. Road and
phosphate solubilizers, nitrifiers and denitrifiers, Utkarsh Vihar (raw) in the same locality.
carbohydrate degraders, hydrocarbon degraders is used Further reduction in odour and BOD and COD values
which has the ability to bioremediate the polluted drain has been recorded during the following months, which
water. are presented in Tables 5 and 6.
After this sampling, the rains started with heavy
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION showers. Its dilution effect is observed and recorded in
Tables 7 and 8.
A quantitative estimation of drain water has also been The results in Tables 7 and 8 indicate the effect of
Int. J. Biotechnol. Food Sci. / Jain et al. 61
Table 3. Water quality of drains not under dosing/bioremediation.
Station pH BOD COD
Palasia nala Deonagar 7.3 220 1500
Utkarsh Vihar (Raw swg) 7.4 215 550
Date of sampling: 12/05/2011. Except pH, all values are expressed in
mg/L.
Table 4. Water quality at bioremediation stations.
Station pH BOD COD
Gurudwara 7.8 120 340
Bhamori 7.90 125 460
Sukhaliya 7.91 135 530
Drain 100 M before confl. in Khan 8.21 75 170
Date of sampling: 20/05/2011. Except pH, all values are expressed in mg/L.
Table 5. Date of sampling: 07/06/2011.
Station pH BOD COD
Gurudwara 7.10 65 150
Bhamori 7.02 80 300
Sukhaliya 7.17 110 210
Drain 100 M before confl. in Khan 7.34 42 140
Table 6. Date of sampling: 06/07/2011.
Station pH BOD COD
Gurudwara 7.53 84 330
Bhamori 7.42 96 340
Sukhaliya 7.51 116 380
Drain 100 M before confl. in Khan 7.31 76 300
Table 7. Date of sampling: 09/08/2011.
Station pH BOD COD
Gurudwara 7.33 26 78
Bhamori 7. 20 26 70
Sukhaliya 7.31 28 80
Table 8. Date of sampling: 26/08/2011.
Station pH BOD COD
Gurudwara 7. 21 28 70
Bhamori 7.14 24 60
Sukhaliya 7.31 28 80
dilution due to rainy water. However, the Palasia drain, It is also evident that there is good reduction in polluting
which was not being treated, showed higher values of the parameters, viz. BOD and COD, as compared with the
pollutants (Table 9). data recorded during same period in other drain (not
62 Int. J. Biotechnol. Food Sci. / Jain et al.
Table 9. Water quality in Palasia drain.
Station pH BOD COD
Palasia Drain (Not under treatment) 7.28 72 228
Figure 3a. Monthly variations in BOD (mg/L) and COD (mg/L) at Gurudwara (LIG).
Figure 3b. Monthly variations in BOD (mg/L) and COD (mg/L) at Bhamori Pul.
Int. J. Biotechnol. Food Sci. / Jain et al. 63
Figure 3c. Monthly variations in BOD (mg/L) and COD (mg/L) at Sukhaliya.
Figure 4. Drain before confluence with Khan River (100 m US).
under treatment) since dilution factor is common in both with Khan River.
these drains. Monthly variations recorded in various Jain (2006) had earlier reported that probiotic
locations are indicated in Figure 3 a, b and c. Figure 4 consortium plays an important role in the reduction of
indicates up to 80% reduction in BOD before confluence pollution load, helps to curb the odour nuisance in the
64 Int. J. Biotechnol. Food Sci. / Jain et al.
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naturally occurring beneficial microbial flora in the natural Control Board for their laboratory support and other helps
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Authors are thankful to Prof. S.P. Gautam chairman, http://www.sciencewebpublishing.net/ijbfs
member secretary and staff of Central Pollution Control
