Sustainable Treatment of Textile Dyeing Wastewater: the Use of Aniline-degrading Bacteria

Aniline compounds are a group of toxic and mutagenic compounds. Despite of the implementation of new stringent discharge standard in China that restricts aniline compounds concentration down to below detection limit, aniline compounds were still found in the effluent discharge. Applicable wastewater treatment method to removal aniline compounds is crucial for the textile industry.

The objective of this project is to enhance the textile dyeing wastewater treatment through identification, cultivation and immobilization of specialized microorganisms for aniline compounds degradation and decolorization. Five typical textile dyeing wastewater treatment plants are selected for evaluation.

The research team analyse the microbial compositions in the wastewater treatment plants by DNA sequencing. They then identify specialized aniline-degrading bacteria and decolorizing bacteria in dyeing wastewater and enhance, enrich and immobilize the specialized microbial consortium in biological treatment. To apply the technology in industrial use, the pilot system pilot system with specialized microbial consortium and enhanced treatment scheme is set up at Pacific Textiles’ factory in Panyu to review its performance on aniline and color removal. The last step is to formulate the enhanced treatment scheme for textile dyeing industry.