Bioremediation of Oil-contaminated Soil Using Chicken Manure

In less developed countries, the prevalence of soil contaminated with used lubricating oil is high and the situation worsens with the economic advancement. The contamination has been shown to adversely affect the environment and human health. To mitigate, bioremediation could be adopted to tackle the problem of hydrocarbon-contaminated soil. Thus, this experimental research carried out the bioremediation using chicken manure in soils contaminated with 5%, 10% and 20% w/w used lubricating oil for a 42-day composting period. To compare, this research also experimented with the 5%, 10% and 20% oil-contaminated soils untreated with chicken manure. The results showed that the highest total petroleum hydrocarbons (TPHs) reduction efficiency of >60% was achieved in the 5% oil-contaminated compost remediated with chicken manure. The highest biodegradation rate of lubricating oil of 0.023-0.0025day(-1) as measured by the first-order kinetics could also be achieved under the 5% oil contamination condition with the application of chicken manure. The findings highlight the prospect of chicken manure as a proper nutrient for enhanced remediation of hydrocarbon-contaminated soils, particularly of low contamination concentrations.