Fate of Crude Oil in Soil Treated with Pseudomonas putida Immobilized on Coconut Coirpith a Lowcost Biocarrier

Abstract

ABSTRACT An attempt was made to study the use of bacterial species Pseudomonas putida immobilized on coconut coir pith to degrade Total Petroleum Hydrocarbon (TPH) present in soil contaminated with crude oil. The soil was spiked with crude oil to get a concentration of 10,000 mg/kg soil. The bacterial species Pseudomonas putida was immobilized on coconut coir pith and used for the degradation of crude oil. The experiment was conducted with four treatments such as T1 (Control (Soil alone)), T2 (Soil + Nutrients + Pseudomonas putida), T3 (Soil + Nutrients + Coconut coir pith), T4 (Soil + Nutrients + Pseudomonas putida immobilized in Coconut coir pith) for 60 days. During the period of the experiment the parameters viz., soil pH, temperature, moisture content, and percent degradation of the TPH compounds were determined. The results revealed that the percent degradation of the TPH was found to be highest for the treatment T4 and at 60th day maximum degradation was recorded. The percent degradation of some of the TPH compounds such as dotriacontane, octane, octacosane, octatriacontane was 45.0, 45.5, 45.2, and 44.5, respectively. The coconut coir pith immobilized with bacterial species Pseudomonas putida can, therefore, prove to be a very good biological treatment option to remediate crude oil-contaminated soils.