Development of floating treatment wetlands with plant-bacteria partnership to clean textile bleaching effluent

Abstract

Treatment of textile wastewater prior to its discharge into the environment is a highly concerned issue of the industry. The current established methods in textile industry for effluent treatment are typically high in cost, require range of chemicals along with the generation of concentrated hazardous sludge. It is therefore inevitable to look for economical and eco-friendly ways to treat textile wastewater. Hence, the present study was endeavored to develop green, chemical free and sustainable bacteria inoculated plant based technique for remedying textile bleaching effluents. A lab scale floating treatment wetlands (FTWs) system was developed and implemented for remediation of H2O2 based textile bleaching wastewater. This system was designed by vegetating two free floating aquatic plants Eichhorniacrassipes and Pistia stratiotes. The performance of this system was enhanced by inoculating two pollutant degrading and plant growth promoting bacteria, Bacillus cereus and Bacillus subtilis. The efficacy of this bacterial augmented FTWs system was assessed by monitoring physicochemical parameters of treated wastewater. A substantial decrease in pH, EC, TDS, TSS, BOD and COD was noted. This stamped the effectiveness of this sustainable technique to treat textile effluents.