Study of anaerobic biofilter tofu wastewater treatment with bioball media and phytoremediation by kiambang (salviniamolesta)

Abstract

Small and medium industries such as tofu industry are characterized as industries with high levels of pollution because it lacks or does not have a wastewater handling system. Tofu wastewater contains high level of chemical oxygen demand (COD) and total suspended solid (TSS). If referring to the standard quality of wastewater, tofu wastewater requires treatment before being discharged into water bodies. This research aims to find out the effect of residence time and plant mass variation on the efficiency of reducing COD and TSS in tofu wastewater. This research were used anaerobic reactors with bioball media and phytoremediation reactors using kiambang (salviniamolesta) with plant mass variations of 50, 100, 150, 200 and 250 grams. The research begins with the process of seeding to breed microorganisms derived from tofu wastewater then proceed with running on the anaerobic reactor until the reduction in COD reaches 60% -70%. On the 6th day of running, the reduction in COD has reached 66.66% so that it can be continued flowing tofu wastewater to the phytoremediation reactor. The process of running on phytoremediation is done with variations in plant mass and residence time of 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 days. The results showed that the variation of residence time affected the level of COD and TSS reduction. In phytoremediation reactors, the best plant mass in reducing COD levels is 250 grams with removal efficiency at D-7 reaching 59.61% while the best plant mass in reducing TSS levels is 50 grams with removal efficiency at D-7 reaching 89.41 %.