Bioremediation of sewage water using microorganisms

Abstract

Bioremediation is the term applied to technologies that accelerate natural processes for degrading or detoxifying harmful chemicals in soil, ground water and waste water. The use of microorganisms mainly bacteria for biore-mediation or transform hazardous contaminants is not a new idea because they have been used since 600 B.C. by the Romans and others to treat their wastewater. In fact, bioremediation has been used commercially for almost 30 years (Ram Nayar, 2005). The first commercial use of bioremediation system was initiated in 1972 to clean up a Sun Oil pipeline spill in Ambler, Pennsylvania (National Research Council, 1993). Since 1972, bioremediation has become a well-developed way of cleaning up different contaminants. A survey prepared by the Environmental Protection Agency in 1992 received information on 240 cases of bioremediation in the United States (Alexander, 1999). Most of these cases involved treating contaminated soil or groundwater. The unprecedented population increase and anthropo-genic activities such as industrialization and urbanization of the twentieth centuary in the name of modernization have not only increased conventional solid and liquid waste pollutants to critical levels but also produced a wide range of previously unknown contaminants (Ram Nayar, 2005). Majority of the contaminants entering into the ecosystems are in the form of chemicals and they affect man, animal life, plant life and microbes and exert serious health and ecological problems newline newline