Regrowth of bacterial pathogen indicators after advanced electro-osmotic dewatering of biosolids Online publication date: Sat, 30-Aug-2014
by Tala Navab-Daneshmand; Gul-E-Hina; Precious Biyela; Dominic Frigon
International Journal of Environment and Waste Management (IJEWM), Vol. 14, No. 2, 2014
Abstract: Applying an electrical field for 10 min to mechanically dewatered biosolids increased dryness to 35 to 45% and reduced Escherichia coli levels to/close to detection limits. Possible reasons for the regrowth of bacterial pathogens impacted by electro-osmotic dewatering are biosolids dryness, low pH and the generation of bacterial oxidants on the anode due to high temperatures. Testing for this with aerobic and anaerobic incubations resulted in more than four logs of E. coli regrowth in 2011, when biosolids harboured higher initial counts; whereas regrowth was not observed in 2012, when biosolids had lower E. coli counts. In 2011 experiments, however, addition of a nitrate salt prior to anaerobic incubations reduced regrowth by 1.4 logs. This indicates that other NO3−-respiring organisms could be competing with E. coli and diverting electrons away from the E. coli population. These results suggest that electro-osmotic dewatering and nitrate can play a role in controlling E. coli regrowth.
Existing subscribers:
Go to Inderscience Online Journals to access the Full Text of this article.
If you are not a subscriber and you just want to read the full contents of this article, buy online access here.Complimentary Subscribers, Editors or Members of the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Environment and Waste Management (IJEWM):
Login with your Inderscience username and password:
Want to subscribe?
A subscription gives you complete access to all articles in the current issue, as well as to all articles in the previous three years (where applicable). See our Orders page to subscribe.
If you still need assistance, please email subs@inderscience.com
Our Blog 
Follow us on Twitter 
Visit us on Facebook