Potential of Nutrient Removal from Sewage by Various Plant Weeds

An attempt was made to investigate the aquatic weeds to remove the nitrogen and phosphorous using four aquatic plants i.e. two emergent plants (Typha latifolia and Phragmites australis) and two floating plants (Eichhornia crassipes and Lamina gibba) from primary treated sewage. This study focuses on the nutrient removal efficiency based on the coverage area and biomass based calculation from the aquatic weeds reactor. Results indicate the highest removal of the nutrients i.e. nitrogen and phosphorous was observed from the plants area based calculation since weight of the emergent plants are higher as compared to floating plants. The study indicates that the physiological characteristics of the aquatic plants greatly affect the performance of the system.