Dairy wastewater treatment with effective microorganisms and duckweed for pollutants and pathogen control

Abstract

Wastewater originated from dairy operations may harbor human pathogens including Escherichia coli (EC). Excess nutrients present in dairy wastewater can also pollute surface and ground waters. Effective microbes (EM) and duckweed have shown a great promise in wastewater treatment. The duckweed growth and EM applications were tested. Combined application of EM and duckweed growth significantly reduced the ammonium nitrogen, total phosphorus, total suspended solids and biological oxygen demand after three months and is a very efficient way of dairy wastewater treatment. © 2007 Springer.