Biological denitrification of a highly nitrogenous industrial effluent: a case study in Zimbabwe

This paper describes the establishment and design of a scheme to denitrify industrial effluent with concentrations of N greater than 2000 mg litre(-1) to levels within the regulatory limits of the Zimbabwe Natural Resources Act which stipulates an upper limit of 10 mg litre(-1) of nitrate in effluent dumped in important catchment areas. The scheme was set up in 1978 and the data used in the discussion are for the year 1983, five years after the establishment of the scheme. The scheme consists of three impounding reservoirs in which effluent is held for at least 24 h in each case so that it undergoes biological denitrification at each stage. In some cases, the effluent is diverted after the second reservoir and is used to irrigate pastures on which dairy cattle are being grazed. In general, under this scheme, the N content of the effluent is within the regulatory limit by the time it enters the main river system, about 8 km away.