DOI 10.4010/2016.1081 ISSN 2321 3361 © 2016 IJESC Research Article Volume 6 Issue No. 4 Conversion of Solid Waste into Bio Gold Using Eudrilus Eugeniae D.Sharmila Environmental Engineering Department of Civil Kalasalingam University, Virudhunagar, Tamil Nadu, India [email protected] Abstract: A 45 day study was conducted to evaluate the efficiency of an exotic earthworm species (Eudrilus eugeniae) for decomposition of different kinds of organic substrates like litter waste and kitchen waste collected from kalasalingam university campus. Vermicomposting was done with the help of cow dung and goat dung to decompose both litter waste and kitchen waste in five different pits. The physico chemical parameters like pH, Electrical conductivity, Nitrogen, Calcium, Zinc, Iron and copper was tested periodically to reveal the condition of the vermibed from the day of starting till the end of 45 day, and finally the above parameters have increased in the pit having the mixture of kitchen waste along with goat dung whereas Phosphorus, Potassium and Sulphur got increased in the pit having the mixture of litter waste along with goat dung. Results reveal that goat dung is much more efficient than cow dung in decomposing the waste. Keywords: Eudrilus eugeniae, litter waste, kitchen waste, cow dung, goat dung I.INTRODUCTION 2. It is voracious feeder on organic matter and prefers The earthworms are a group of invertebrates belonging to food richer in nitrogen, cellulose and the phylum Annelida and class Oligochaeta and represented microorganisum (Hartenstein and Bisesi, 1989) by more than 1000 spices. Earthworm is a face organism and all kinds of organic wastes having these and it is present in moist and dark places in mud. qualities form the diet to this worm. Earthworms are of great economics value to mankind 3. The biomass, turnover is the most important factor because they improve the soil quality by their action. in the species selection for vermicomposting, Earthworms ingest organic material and facilities the E.eugeniae attains higher biomass turnover within redistribution of crop residues and organic matter shorter period of time with higher fecundity than throughout the soil profile (Timothy et al., 1993). In the any other species of earthworms (Hartenstein and Indian subcontinent earth worms are represented by 509 Bisesi, 1989, and Kale, et al., 1992). species in 67 genera under 10 families (Julka,1993). 4. It has a shorter incubation period, higher fecundity and shorter life cycle with longevity more than one BIOLOGY OF EUDRILUS EUGINEAE year. 5. Easy maintenance of this worm. EUDRILUS EUGENIAE II. PROPOSED METHOD E.eugeniae also known as the African night crawler is an exotic worm. Its systematic position is PHYSICO CHEMICAL PARAMETERS OF Phylum : Annelida DIFFERENT VERMICOMPOSTS Subphylum : Clitellata PHYSICAL PARAMETERS Class : Oligochaeta Order : Haplotaxida A. DETERMINATION OF pH Family : Eudrilidae The pH is defined as the negative log to the basse 10 of Genus : Eudrilus the H+ ion concentration. The pH of the bedding materials Species : eugeniae was determined Potentiometric method using a digital pH meter The exotic earthworm, E.eugeniae has been chosen for the present study based on the following reasons. B. DETERMINATION OF ELECTRICAL 1. The prevalling climatic condition in South India is CONDUCTIVITY (EC) ideal for the activity of E.eugeniae (Bano and Kale, Electrical conductivity is the measurement of total amount 1988). The worms perform well at tropical and of soluble salts present in the sample and is expressed as subtropical conditions. millisimens/m (mS/cm). International Journal of Engineering Science and Computing, April 2016 4739 http://ijesc.org/ C. ESTIMATION OF TOTAL NITROGEN (N) manure and crop residues, in long rows. This method is The total nitrogen of the sample was estimated by Kjeldahl suited to producing large volumes of compost. These rows method as per (Tandon, 1993). This method involved two are generally turned to improve porosity and oxygen steps (i) digestion of the sample to convert the N compound content, mix in or remove moisture and redistribute cooler in the sample to the NH4+ form and (ii) distillation and and hotter portions of the pile. Windrow composting is a determination of NH4+ in the digest. commonly used farm scale composting method. D. ESTIMATION OF PHOSPHORUS (P) III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Total phosphorus content of the sample was estimated as per PHYSICO – CHEMICAL PARAMETERS OF FIVE Tandon (1993) by colorimetric method. DIFFERENT COMPOSTING SYSTEMS ON INITIAL E. ESTIMATION OF POTASSIUM (K) STAGE Total potassium content of the manure sample was determined as per (Tandon, 1993) by flame photometric PARAMETERS PIT - PIT -2 PIT – PIT – PIT – method. The unknown sample was atomized in the flame 1 3 4 5 photometric and the readings were recorded. pH 6.01 5.96 6.37 6.50 6.66 F. ESTIMATION OF SODIUM (Na) ELECTRICAL 0.67 0.85 0.73 0.81 0.84 Sodium content of the sample was determined by following CONDUVTIVITY the procedure of (Tandon, 1993) as described in potassium NITROGEN 0.50 0.93 0.61 0.56 0.53 estimation. PHOSPHOROUS 0.28 0.31 0.42 O.36 0.36 G. DETERMINATION OF CALCIUM (Ca) POTASSIUM 0.36 0.45 0.45 0.46 0.40 The calcium and Magnesium contents of the sample were CALCIUM 0.78 1.62 1.51 1.71 1.60 determined as per procedure of (Tandon, 1993). MAGNESIUM 0.60 0.51 0.61 0.73 0.27 H. DETERMINATION OF MAGNESIUM (Mg) Magnesium content was calculated from the difference SULPHUR 0.11 0.15 0.39 0.17 0.09 between the contents Ca Mg and the calcium content ZINC 12.1 27.23 12.75 9.78 16.29 I. ESTIMATION OF SULPHUR (S) IRON 593 608.60 728.80 659.24 823.20 Total sulphur content was normally estimated by wet ashing MANGANESE 250 384.70 380.60 305.17 182.06 of plants tissue sample (manure) as described under phosphorous Diacid digestion) and the sulphate turbidimety COPPER 157.6 144.80 167.13 164.33 182.43 method as described by (Tandon, 193). PHYSICO – CHEMICAL PARAMETERS OF FIVE J. ESTIMATION OF ZINC AND COPPER (Zn & Cu) TH DIFFERENT COMPOSTING SYSTEMS ON 30 DAY Zinc and copper content were estimated using Atomic Absorption Spectrphotometer (AAS) according to the PARAMETERS PIT -1 PIT -2 PIT – 3 PIT – PIT – 5 procedure outlined by (Tandon, 1993), Zinc and copper 4 concentrations in the sample were determined after pH 6.49 6.77 6.98 6.70 7.01 preparing a standard curve and also after calibrating the AAS using standards of known ppm concentration of zine Electrical 0.70 0.91 0.82 0.78 0.75 and copper solutions. conductivity Nitrogen 0.76 1.09 0.95 1.23 1.52 K. ESTIMATION OF IRON (Fe) Phosphorous 0.49 1.31 1.11 0.74 0.76 The iron concentration was estimated using a spectrophotometer as per the procedure outlined by Potassium 0.34 0.82 0.86 0.92 0.89 (Jackson, 1973). Calcium 1.02 2.20 1.75 1.20 2.73 Magnesium 0.83 0.90 1.04 1.35 0.32 L. ESTIMATION OF MANGANESE (Mn) The Manganese concentration was estimated Sulphur 0.17 0.27 0.18 0.25 0.10 using a spectrophotometer as per the procedure described by Zinc 14.61 40.46 19.12 12 31 (Chopra and Kanwar, 1991). Iron 598.60 922.82 1002.60 957.80 1226.10 WINDROW METHOD Manganese 293 644.33 726.57 689.16 208.53 Windrow composting is the production of compost by piling Copper 176.60 366.83 390.66 282.63 405.33 organic matter or bio-degradable waste, such as animal International Journal of Engineering Science and Computing, April 2016 4740 http://ijesc.org/ PHYSICO – CHEMICAL PARAMETERS OF FIVE COMBINED PHYSICO CHEMICAL PARAMETERS OF DIFFERENT COMPOSTING SYSTEMS ON 45TH DAY FIVE PITS ON INITIAL STAGE, 30TH DAY AND 45TH DAY PARAMETERS PIT - PIT -2 PIT – 3 PIT – 4 PIT – 1 5 pH pH 6.97 7.68 7.71 7.76 8.1 ELECTRICAL 0.97 1.88 2.13 1.83 1.89 CONDUVTIVIT pH Y 10 NITROGEN 0.98 1.29 1.02 1.35 1.80 ZERO TH DAY 5 PHOSPHOROU 1.05 2.23 2.19 2 1.89 30TH DAY S 0 45 TH DAY POTASSIUM 1 1.46 1.02 1.24 1.12 1 2 3 4 5 CALCIUM 1.41 3.4 2.50 2.11 4.84 PITS ELECTRICAL CONDUCTIVITY MAGNESIUM 0.96 1.5 1.91 2.23 0.63 SULPHUR 0.22 0.55 0.43 0.51 0.21 ELECTRICAL ZINC 16.96 62.10 31.76 25.60 63.30 CONDUCTIVITY IRON 697.6 1481.60 1532.30 1464.30 2077 3 ZEROTH DAY MANGANESE 302 909.30 1093.30 1086.60 312.60 2 COPPER 194 680 807.30 785 958 30 TH DAY 1 0 45 TH DAY MORPHOLOGICAL CHANGES OF EARTHWORMS FROM FIRST DAY TO 45TH DAY OF CULTURE 1 2 3 4 5 PITS S PARA P P P P P N METE I I I I I TOTAL NITROGEN O R T T T T T 1 2 3 4 5 1 4 1 4 1 4 1 4 1 4 S 5T S 5T S 5T S 5T S 5T TOTAL NITROGEN T H T H T H T H T H 2 1 MATU 5 1 5 1 0 0 5 1 5 1 ZEROTH RE 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 2 1.5 DAY WOR 2 0 5 3 1 30TH DAY MS 2 YOUN 0 3 0 3 0 0 0 2 0 3 0.5 G 0 2 2 1 0 45TH DAY WOR 1 2 3 4 5 MS 3 COCO 0 1 0 2 0 0 0 1 0 1 PITS ONS 5 0 3 7 International Journal of Engineering Science and Computing, April 2016 4741 http://ijesc.org/ TOTAL PHOSPHORUS TOTAL SULPHUR TOTAL TOTAL SULPHUR PHOSPHORUS 0.6 0.5 3 0.4 ZERTH DAY 2 ZEROTH DAY 0.3 30TH DAY 30TH DAY 1 0.2 0 45TH DAY 0.1 45TH DAY 1 2 3 4 5 0 PITS 1 2 3 4 5 TOTAL POTASSIUM PITS TOTAL ZINC TOTAL POTASSIUM TOTAL ZINC 2 ZEROTH 80 1.5 DAY 60 1 30TH DAY ZEROTH DAY 0.5 40 30TH DAY 45TH DAY 0 20 45TH DAY 1 2 3 4 5 0 PITS 1 2 3 4 5 TOTAL CALCIUM PITS TOTAL CALCIUM TOTAL IRON 6 ZEROTH TOTAL IRON 4 DAY 3000 30TH DAY 2000 ZEROTH DAY 2 30TH DAY 45TH DAY 1000 0 45TH DAY 0 1 2 3 4 5 1 2 3 4 5 PITS TOTAL MAGNESIUM PITS TOTAL MANGANESE TOTAL MAGNESIUM TOTAL MANGANESE 2.5 1500 2 1.5 ZEROTH DAY 1000 ZEROTH DAY 1 30TH DAY 30TH DAY 500 0.5 45TH DAY 45TH DAY 0 0 1 2 3 4 5 1 2 3 4 5 PITS PITS International Journal of Engineering Science and Computing, April 2016 4742 http://ijesc.org/ TOTAL COPPER CALCIUM (Ca) In general, significant increase in calcium content was TOTAL COPPER observed in all the five different composting system on 45th 1200 day over the control.