Abstract
The bioremediation of soils polluted with hydrocarbons demonstrated to be a simple and cheap technique, even if it needs a long time. The current paper shows the application of statistical analysis, based on two factors involved in the biological process at several levels. We focus on the Design of Experiments (DOE) to determine the number and kind of experimental runs, whereas the use of the categorical factors has not been widely exploited up to now. This method is especially useful to analyze factors with levels constituted by categories and define the interaction effects. Particularly, we focused on the statistical analysis of (1) experimental runs carried out at laboratory scale (test M, in microcosm), on soil polluted with diesel oil, and (2) bench scale runs (test B, in biopile), on refinery oil sludge mixed with industrial or agricultural biodegradable wastes. Finally, the main purpose was to identify the factor’s significance in both the tests and their potential interactions, by applying the analysis of variance (ANOVA). The results demonstrate the robustness of the statistical method and its quality, especially when at least one of the factors cannot be defined with a numerical value.
Highlights
Industrial development has caused a dramatic increase in the amount of crude oil used
We focus on the Design of Experiments (DOE) to determine the number and kind of experimental runs, whereas the use of the categorical factors has not been widely exploited up to now
We focused on the statistical analysis of (1) experimental runs carried out at laboratory scale, on soil polluted with diesel oil, and (2) bench scale runs, on refinery oil sludge mixed with industrial or agricultural biodegradable wastes
Summary
Industrial development has caused a dramatic increase in the amount of crude oil used. The rapid expansion of crude oil industries has led to the generation of large volumes of hydrocarbons that need attention due to their environmental and health impacts [1]. Pollution by hydrocarbons is associated with different industrial activities which may harm the environment and human health [2]. It is generally accepted that this kind of pollution has an anthropogenic origin, often due to accidental spill from production units and transport pipelines, leakages from storage facilities and underground tanks, mining, human activities in the production, transportation, and improper or illegal behaviours in waste treatment and disposal [3,4,5]. There is growing public concern about the large volume of hydrocarbons that can be inadvertently or deliberately emitted into the environment [5,7,8]
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