Phytoremediation systems for treatment contaminant mixture in petrochemical wastewater / Siti Aisyahaisar Binti Zakaria

Project paper (Bachelor of Civil Engineering) -- Universiti Malaysia Pahang - 2007

A clean environment is most important for the sustenance of present and future generations. It is difficult to separate industrial growth from environmental pollution but it can be minimized through cost effective approaches of pollution abatement by adoption of alternative technologies which suit the situation of low capital availability, minimum man-power and limited energy consumption are necessary. Phytoremediation is one of alternative technology process that uses green plants to remove, transfer, stabilize, and destroy contaminants may be either organic or inorganic in soil, and sediment. Plants can take up heavy metals by their roots, or even via their stems and leaves, and accumulate them in their organs as a food. For this study, the objectives are to identify the performance of Lepironia articulata plants in phytoremediation systems and to determine the capability of phytoremediation systems for treatment of contaminant mixture in petrochemical wastewater. All tests are done about three months for monitoring, testing, reporting and maintaining of the performance samples. About nine parameters which are turbidity, suspended solids (SS), Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD), Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD), Dissolved Oxygen (DO), pH, Zinc (Zn), Chromium (Cr), and Nickel (Ni) tested into 30 samples from domestic wastewater at outlet Sewerage Treatment Plant (STP) A UMP (plot 1), industrial wastewater at discharge effluent Kaneka (M) Sdn Bhd (plot 2) and distilled water as a controller (Plot 3) with planting the plants by stagnation method at each sample plots. The results of this study show that all samples are under control and fulfill the Environmental Quality Act (EQA) 1974 Standard requirements. For performances of Lepironia articulata plants will be summarize that all of plants are positive growth with 24.93% for Plot 1,28.94% for Plot 2 and 19.19% for Plot 3. Plants for Plot 2 are more aggressive growths because of more nutrients contain compare to other plots. Other than that, for Plot 3 was used distilled water that zero nutrients need for planting growth can lead to cause of slower growth rate. Based on the results of this study, it can be concluded that the phytoremediation systems have a potential to capable for more treated of contaminant mixture in petrochemical wastewater especially. -Author