A novel two-stage process for the effective treatment of swine wastewater using Chlorella sorokiniana AK-1 based algal-bacterial consortium under semi-continuous operation

Abstract

This study aimed at developing an eco-friendly and effective treatment for swine wastewater (SWW) using a designer microalgae-bacteria consortium. A functional algal bacterial consortium was developed with SWWderived bacteria and Chlorella sorokiniana AK-1. Light intensity (300 μmol/m2/s) and inoculum size (0.15 and 0.2 g/L for microalgae and bacteria) were optimized. Semi-batch operation treating 50 % SWW resulted in a COD, BOD, TN, and TP removal efficiency of 81.1 ± 0.9 %, 97.0 ± 0.7 %, 90.6 ± 1.6 % and 91.3 ± 1.1 %, respectively. A novel two-stage process with an initial bacterial start-up stage followed by microalgal inoculation was applied for attaining stable organic carbon removal, in addition to satisfactory TN and TP removal. Full strength SWW was treated with this strategy with COD, BOD, TN, and TP removal efficiencies of 72.1 %, 94.9 %,