Published in Scientific Papers. Series E. Land Reclamation, Earth Observation & Surveying, Environmental Engineering, Vol. XI
Written by Stefan-Mihai PETREA, Ira-Adeline SIMIONOV, Alina ANTACHE, Aurelia NICA, Maxim ARSENI, Adrian ROȘU, Dragos CRISTEA, Mihaela NECULITA
The long-term increased demand for animal-based protein had determined the practice of intensive farming technologies, strategy that may rise environmental sustainability issues. Aquaculture food production industry manages both to satisfy market demand for fish and contributes to restocking programs conducted in order to support biodiversity conservation programs. Integrating aquaponics techniques into already existing recirculating aquaculture production systems may represent a solution for limiting the environmental impact, while maintain a high production intensity. The present study targets to identify the basil phytoremediation potential by evaluating its phosphorus removal capacity from the technological water resulted by practicing intensive sturgeons aquaculture. The P mass balance is identified in order to determine the sustainability of the tested, aquaponics based, water treatment solution, by considering the P concentrations of fish feed, solid waste, wastewater, technological water, fish and plants biomass. The results indicate that basil presents high P removal capacity and both hydraulic parameters and regimes are important parameters to be considered in the phytoremediation technology optimization process. Similar studies are recommended to be performed by testing both aquaponics deep water and nutrient film techniques.
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