Specifications: The pig slurry treatment is one of the most difficult wastewater to deal with all over the world. A pig farm in Northern Greece has decided to use the Root Zone Method for treating its pig wastewater. The pilot plant has been constructed to treat a daily flow of 30-50 m3/d.

The sedimentation of the slurry mixed with a lot of water takes place in a big lagoon where it stays for about 60 days. The lagoon overflow comes into the Root Zone plant by natural flow. Here takes place the biological treatment not only of the carbon organic matter but simultaneously also for the nitrogen organic mater. Although this wastewater is very problematic the results are very successful. Thus by 45-75 % COD degradation also a 60-65 % Nitrogen dissimilation occurs simultaneously.

These results not only show the possibility of a successful treatment of the pig slurry but also because of these up to now unknown phenomenon that means that much less surface than in the beginning believed it will be needed. The financial implications to this are enormous for the pig breading industry. But also the environmental impacts are huge because of the degradation of very heavily loaded wastewater.

The results of the surveying of this pilot project for 1 year have been presented at the 1st International Conference on "Hazardous Waste Management" in October 2008, in Chania Crete. (see the presentation below)

Scientific Publication: Degradation of nitrogen compounds from heavily loaded wastewater of pig manure by the Root-zone method (in English)

Technical Characteristics:
Unit's daily flow: 30-50 m3/d
Size of the ROOT ZONE plant: 1300 m2
Construction's year: 2004
Input COD-loading: 2100-3100 mg/l
Input Ntotal-loading: 1050-1500 mg/l
Output COD-loading: 500-950 mg/l
Output Ntotal-loading: 430-550 mg/l