TERI says bioremediation off Navy Nagar coast over

The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) that had taken up the task of cleaning the Mumbai shoreline following the oil spill caused by the collision of MSC Chitra and MV Khalijia 3 in August last year.

The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) that had taken up the task of cleaning the Mumbai shoreline following the oil spill caused by the collision of MSC Chitra and MV Khalijia 3 in August last year,said on Monday that it had completed the process of bioremediation along the Navy Nagar Coast,with 90 per cent success.

The New Delhi-based institute was appointed to carry out partial clean-up of the shore at Navy Nagar in Colaba,where the effect of the oil-spill was felt the most. It was appointed by the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board to carry out the bioremediation process using the oil-zapper technology. TERI started work on the Awas beach near Alibaug and Navy Nagar in Colaba a couple of weeks after the collision. TERI,which had invented the oil-zapper technology of bio-remediation,along with the Department of Biotechnology of the Central government after seven years of research,scooped oil-stained sand from a 1.2-km stretch of the beach at Navy Nagar with the help of over 100 NCC volunteers. It was dumped into a bio-remediation pit about 200 metres from the shore and the oil-zapper technology was applied.

While it was initially estimated that the process will take two to four months,the actual time taken was six months due to the presence of many non-biodegradable substances. The process at Awas beach was completed in two months but this one took more time as the activity of microbes was hindered and slowed down by the presence of non-degradable items, said Rajiv Chhibber,manager of communications at TERI.

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Dr Banwari Lal,National Director,Environmental and Industrial Technology,TERI,said,Over a period of six months,the microbes i.e. the biological organisms ate up the contaminants (mostly organic compounds),converted them into carbon dioxide and cleaned up the surrounding area without any harmful residue or side-effects.

He added the process took about 141 days and the oil content level has been brought down drastically. It is found that the oil content at the bioremediation site had been biodegraded from 38.1 per cent (i.e. 3,81,000 mg/kg) on the first day to 4.19 per cent (i.e. 41,900 mg/kg) after 141 days,indicating 89 per cent biodegradation in 141 days, said Dr Lal. To assess the effectiveness of the oil-zapper technology,a control site was created without any microbial intervention. Oil content at the site without the application of this technology got degraded from 45.60 per cent (i.e. 4,56,000 mg/kg) on first day to 41.31 per cent (i.e. 4,31,000 mg/kg) in 141 days,indicating degradation of only 9.4 per cent.

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