Abstract
This paper describes a case study that was carried out on a Sicilian company (Italy) dealing with separate waste collection and recycling of glass. The aims of this study were to evaluate the overall efficiency of a vertical subsurface flow system (VSSFs) constructed wetland (CW) operating for the treatment of first-flush stormwater and the effects of treated wastewater on the morphological and aesthetic characteristics of ornamental pepper and rosemary plants. The system had a total surface area of 46.80 m2 and was planted with common reed and giant reed. Wastewater samples were taken from October 2018 to July 2019 at the CW inlet and outlet for chemical-physical and microbiological characterization of the wastewater. Two separate experimental fields of rosemary and ornamental pepper were set up in another Sicilian location. Three sources of irrigation water, two accessions of rosemary and two varieties of ornamental pepper were tested in a split-plot design for a two-factor experiment. The results showed very high organic pollutant removal (BOD5 75–83%, COD 65–69%) and a good efficiency of nutrients (TN 60–66%) and trace metals (especially for Cu and Zn) removal. Escherichia coli concentration levels were always lower than 100 CFU 100 mL−1 during the test period. Irrigation water and plant habitus had significant effects on all the morphological and aesthetic characteristics of the plants. For both the crops, plants irrigated with freshwater and treated wastewater had greater growth and showed a better general appearance in comparison with plants irrigated with wastewater. The higher trace metal levels in the wastewater produced adverse effects on plant growth and reduced the visual quality of the plants. Our results suggest the suitability of a VSSFs constructed wetland for the treatment of first-flush stormwater and the reuse of treated wastewater for irrigation purposes, in accordance with legislation requirements concerning wastewater quality.
Highlights
In urban areas, stormwater runoff has been recognized as a substantial contributor to water quality degradation due to high pollutants concentrations [1,2,3]
constructed wetland (CW) (ExpA_1 (ExpA_1 code) code) that that was was built within the industrial area of a Sicilian company dealing with separate waste collection and built within the industrial area of a Sicilian company dealing with separate waste collectionglass and
The application of a vertical subsurface flow system (VSSFs) CW in urban and industrial areas could led to evident ecological benefits due to the fact that a VSSFs significantly improves the quality of this type of wastewater and reduces pollutant mass loads, preventing the pollution of receiving water bodies and soil
Summary
Stormwater runoff has been recognized as a substantial contributor to water quality degradation due to high pollutants concentrations [1,2,3]. The concentration peak tends to vary for various pollutants during the same storm event and it has been demonstrated that pollutants concentrations are generally higher at an early stage of the rainfall event than in later stages [4,5,6,7] This phenomenon has been named first-flush event and determined as a relatively high proportion of the total pollutants load of stormwater [8]. As stated by various authors [5,10,16,17,18], pollutants in a first-flush event tend to vary in qualitative and quantitative terms due to the fact that this phenomenon is greatly affected by various factors such as rainfall intensity and duration, watershed area, impervious area and previous dry weather conditions
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