NHx and NOx Contaminated Soil and Water

Overview

Excess nitrogen in groundwater, surface water, aquaculture ponds and soil can result from agricultural runoff, excessive fertilisation of gardens, improperly treated sewage release, industrial processes, and mine site explosive residues can lead to environmental problems such as blue-green algae blooms and pathogen proliferation. Our bioremediation services focus on microbial denitrification to reduce nitrogen levels.

Key NOx NHx Services

Preliminary evaluation

We can advise on whether bioremediation may be appropriate for your contaminated site and what initial testing would be worthwhile to consider (both microbial and chemical).

Microdiagnostic Evaluation

While many labs in Australia can provide the chemical analysis, we are unique in our comprehensive suite of micro-diagnostic analysis tool. Our micro-diagnostics for ammonia or nitrate contaminated sites include:

NextGen Bacteria Community Profile: for insights into the presence of known ammonia and nitrite oxidising bacteria (for ammonium removal) and denitrifying bacteria (for nitrate removal).
qPCR abundance for functional microorganisms and genes: we use qPCR assays to quantify the abundance of genes encoding key enzymes in biotransformation of nitrogenous compounds including ammonia monooxygenase, nitrite reductase and nitrate reductase.

Treatability benchtesting

After the initial micro-diagnostic analysis, it may be possible to directly advise actions as part of a remediation action plan. In other cases, where additional reassurance is appropriate, Micronovo Technologies can conduct laboratory bench tests to directly demonstrate the efficacy of a proposed treatment, providing rates of contaminant transformation for estimation of project duration.

Treatment

Micronovo Technologies holds exclusive licenses to manufacture and deliver a comprehensive library of bacterial cultures for nitrification and denitrification, transforming excess ammonium into inert nitrogen gas. We also provide amendments to enhance ammonia oxidising and heterotrophic denitrification activity.

Monitoring

With our molecular biology expertise, we can assist with monitoring the abundance of ammonia oxidising and denitrifying organisms throughout your project to ensure cell concentrations are maintained for optimal transformation rates.