Abstract:
In wastewater engineering, one of the most sophisticated methods of wastewater
treatment is the tertiary treatment or biological treatment. A large number of inputs in the
form of capital investment and energy have been placed for few decades now for meeting
up the wastewater treatment objectives. To compensate these costs, natural wastewater
treatment technologies, particularly the application of aquatic plants for wastewater
treatment have been considered for quite long. The ability of aquatic ecosystem, mainly
the aquatic plants to carry out wastewater purification has been exploited and this forms
one of the major principles for natural wastewater treatment technologies. This study
report, constitute of various underlying concepts and principles involved in the
wastewater treatment using aquatic plants. The report also present the results obtained
from the research study carried to investigate the treatment or removal efficiency of
aquatic plants to remove pollutants from wastewater via constructed wetland technology.
A generalized criterion for selection of aquatic plants has also been presented after
undertaking different literature study. From the experimental work, it was evident that
aquatic plant brings about significant removal rate when design for optimum operating
conditions. Aquatic plant systems are as valid as land treatment systems or conventional
systems, but each has its strong and weak points. Aquatic plants are not the answer to
every problem, but they should at least be considered during design reviews. Small
communities with some open land are prime candidates for an aquatic plant system. More
attention needs to be devoted to macrophytes species selection for maximizing the
treatment performances.
