Assessment of Distillery Effluent Irrigation on Soil Microbes and Its Bioremediation

The present study deals with the assessment of toxicity of distillery effluent on soil microorganisms and its quality improvement through bioremediation using Pseudomonas spp. Under lab scale experiment, different dilutions of distillery effluent i.e. 25%, 50%, 75% were used to examine effects on physico-chemical parameters of effluent and on soil microflora e.g. algae, bacteria, fungi and actinomycetes. The results revealed that dilution may reduce significantly the metal contents and other toxicants in the effluent as well as in the soil. Statistical analysis revealed that bioremediation of distillery effluent using Pseudomonas spp. caused significant reduction in BOD, COD, TDS, TN, TP and color. The study indicates that raw distillery effluent is harmful for soil microflora and bioremediation improves the quality of distillery effluent making it suitable as a soil amendment.