Evaluación de remoción de contaminantes en aguas residuales domésticas por plantas ornamentales mediante humedales flotantes en el Cantón Militar de Apiay, Villavicencio (Meta)

Abstract

This degree work consisted of evaluating the ability to remove organic pollutants characterized through the Biological Oxygen Demand (BOD), Total Suspended Solids (SST) and nutrients, such as orthophosphates (P-PO4) and Total Nitrogen (NT) from two emergent ornamental plants - hygrophytes, Heliconia psittacorum and Alpinia purpurata, for the treatment of domestic wastewater (ARDs) with pretreatment, from the community of the Military Canton of Apiay, using six floating mantle wetlands on a pilot scale. The methodology carried out consisted of an experimental field investigation, in which the plant species were initially adapted to domestic wastewater (ARD) and the plants with the best adaptation results were selected by transferring them to the floating structures. For the treatment of ARDs, hydraulic retention times (HRT) of 4, 6 and 8 days were established, in which six treatments were performed in duplicate. In addition to the treatments from the floating wetlands, the efficiency of the current treatment system for the stabilization lagoons found in the Military Canton of Apiay and with the vegetation Lemma sp. and Chrysopogon zizanioides, this in order to compare the removal efficiencies of the systems. The results of the present study were analyzed using Microsoft Excel and IBM SPSS statistics. The results obtained reached removals by floating wetlands with the species Alpinia purpurata of BOD5 in 36.14%, SST of 61.91% and P-PO4 in 46.35%. The wetlands with Heliconia psittacorum reached BOD5 removals of 23.21%, SST of 62.66%, P-PO4 of 88.77% and NT of 32.20%. The stabilization lagoons obtained removal percentages of BOD5 of 57.14% (average of both lagoons), P-PO4 of 31.64% and NT of 25.00%. According to the results, Heliconia psittacorum showed greater removal of pollutants in the 4-day HRT with an efficiency of 40.56%, followed in the 8-day HRT by 37.53%; in the same way, the results obtained by floating wetlands are considerable, being a viable alternative for the treatment of ARDs, for possible future implementation, becoming a complementary system for stabilization ponds.