Bioremediation of Aged Petroleum Oil Contaminated Soil: From Laboratory Scale to Full Scale Application

Large quantity of aged petroleum oil contamination such as dehydrated oil sludge, generated in the disposal process of oil-containing sewage in Indonesia. This study aims to investigate the OSCS removal by mean of bioremediation technique. Results found that petrofilic consortia and biosurfactants addition increased the removal efficiency up to 46% and 85%, respectively. At full scale application, this technique succeed in removing of 46 g TPH per kg soil from 4 883 m3 of OSCS during 16 mo of treatment. These results suggest that petrofilic consortia and biosurfactants addition stimulate the biodegradation and overcome the limitation of OSCS degradation process.