Removal of phosphate by microalgae from municipal wastewater effluents: Lab Experiment

Phosphate ions is one of the chemical pollutants that enters to the surface and underground water through municipal, industrial and agricultural wastewater. The aim of this study is to investigate the removal of phosphate from wastewater by Chlorella vulgaris and Spirulina platensis. To this purpose the microalgae added to 350 ml wastewater in lab experiment. In order to evaluate the effect of phosphorus removal, the experiment were performed during 8 days. The initial dry weight of Chlorella vulgaris and Spirulina platensis in wastewater samples were 0.02 and 0.05 g/L, respectively. During the growth period, the concentration of phosphate in aqueous solution were measured on days 1st, 4th, 6th and 8th by APHA standard methods through Bio spec-1601 spectrophotometer. Based on the results, the percentage of phosphorus removal by Chlorella vulgaris was 40.65, 38.0124.45 and 72.21, and by Spirulina platensis was 20.13, 20.01, 10.44 and 42.79 for days 1 to 4, 4 to 6, 6 to 8 and 1 to 8, respectively. The final dry weight of Chlorella vulgaris and Spirulina platensis in wastewater samples were 3.93 and 1.93 g/L, respectively. From this study it can be concluded that the algae are able to remove phosphorus from wastewater and Chlorella vulgaris has higher ability of reducing phosphorus from waste water, and could be good candidate to reduce the phosphate in wastewater treatment.