Innovative routes for upcycling meat industry waste streams and water treatment

Student name: Ahmed Abdellatif

RUN-EU institution: Technological University of the Shannon: Midlands Midwest, Ireland

Abstract

Due to the increasing human population and the expansion of global economy, shortage of water resources has occurred, and water remediation became a global concern. Slaughterhouses may release wastewater in the environment that may contain high amounts of nitrogen, carbon, phosphorus, and other eutrophication-causing-nutrients which can accumulate in the environment and have negative impacts. Microalgal wastewater bioremediation has gained the focus due to its low energy needs, the ability to grow in different environmental conditions, consume wastewater eutrophication-causing-nutrients, and capture carbon dioxide. This research studied the growth effect of two microalgal types (type 1 and 2) on different wastewater concentrations and their ability to remediate wastewater from slaughterhouses by reducing the eutrophication-causing-nutrients concentrations. The results show that microalgae type 1 managed to grow in wastewater by 978 times of its original concentration in 38 days, while microalgae type 2 managed to grow by 727 times of its original concentration in 38 days. After 38 days, both microalgae type 1 and 2 had an effect on decreasing the eutrophication-causing-nutrients in wastewater. The decrease of total organic carbon was 88% and 95%, total nitrogen was 97% and 65%, phosphate was 55% and 70% and sulphate was 63% and 67% respectively by microalgae type 1 and 2. The experiment shows that microalgae can promisingly grow on wastewater and reduce the eutrophication-causing-nutrients; however, further optimisation studies should be considered when this bioremediation process is upscaled.