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Vermiremediation of Soils Contaminated with Mixture of Petroleum Products using Eisenia fetida
KELECHI, L. NJOKU; MODUPE, O. AKINOLA & CATHERINE, C. ANIGBOGU
Abstract
In this paper, vermiremediation, a biological technique was utilized in
order to clean-up soil contaminated with gasoline, diesel and spent engine oil using an
earthworm - Eisenia fetida. The contaminated soils were analyzed for the total petroleum
hydrocarbon (TPH) level every 24 hours over a period of 120 hours using gas
chromatography. It was observed that at each sampling time, the soils samples without
the earthworm had more quantity of TPH than the corresponding samples with the
earthworms. Pentadecane, 2,6,10, trimethyl had 100% reduction after 120 hours followed
by octadecane with 67.30 % reduction and tetracosane with 50.28% reduction. In all
sampling time, the initial octadecane level was significantly higher than the final
octadecane level in soil with E. fetida (P<0.05). Also, the initial hexadecanoic acid
methyl ester level was significantly higher than the level of the hydrocarbon in the soils
with E. fetida after 96 hour incubation and soil without the earthworm after 72 hours
incubation (P<0.05). After the 24 hours incubation the octadecane level in soil with E.
fetida was significantly lower than the initial level and the level in soil without the
earthworm (P<0.01).The results showed that E. fetida enhances the degradation and
reduction of TPH levels in soils and therefore can be used for cleaning up of soils
contaminated with mixture of petroleum products. This is useful in reclaiming mechanic
workshop soils for agricultural purposes hence increase in food production. © JASEM
Keywords
Vermiremediation; petroleum; contamination; earthworm; Eisenia fetida
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