The applicability of anaerobically treated domestic wastewater as a nutrient medium in hydroponic lettuce cultivation: Nitrogen toxicity and health risk assessment.

Abstract

The applicability of anaerobic effluent (AE) from an anaerobic membrane bioreactor (AnMBR) treating domestic wastewater as a nutrient medium was evaluated through hydroponic cultivation of lettuce. The growth of lettuce plants on AE media was significantly inhibited to 31-40% in height and 36-48% in number of leaves compared to that on half-strength Hoagland solution (HHS) as a control. The primary cause of inhibition was nitrite toxicity as induced by partial nitrification. Therefore, the nitrification of AE as a pre-treatment step was adopted to prevent the toxicity of nitrite. The heights of lettuce grown on nitrified anaerobic effluent (NAE) and nitrified anaerobic effluent with 96mg/L sulfate (NAES) were in the range of 11.4-11.5cm and was comparable to that on control solution (11.4cm). The potential health risk for heavy metals was insignificant based on health risk index (HRI<1) and targeted hazardous quotient (THQ<1). These results show that efficient crop production can be achieved with AE, but suitable pre-treatment steps should be followed.