Abstract:
Constructed wetland method is one of potential treatment alternative that can be employed
using emergent plants to remove pollutant from various types of wastewater. Although, it
has been known that several type of plants can be used for this purpose, only limited studies
have shown the contribution of emergent plant itself for treatment of wastewater. Another
complicated situation is that the efficiency of treatment depends on local environmental
factors and the quality and quantity of wastewater. This study focused on the efficiency of
Typha Latifolia grown in constructed wetland for the treatment of municipal wastewater
from Baticaloa municipal council. The treatment efficiencies were obtained using the
different water quality parameters at different hydraulic retention times at the wetland,
comparing with the initial values of the parameters. The removal or retention of pollutants
in wastewater may also occur due to the sorption to soil in the bed or due to the natural
attenuation mediated by microbial communities by redox mediated abiotic reactions and
therefore removal efficiencies were also studied in controlled systems with the exception
of plant growth under similar environmental conditions. The result shows that the highest
removal efficiencies were 89%, 92%, 94%, 94%, 97%, 94% and 95% for N0 3" P04‘3 COD,
Mn, Zn, BOD and TSS in Typha latifolia system while the values calculated for wetlands
with the exception of plant growth were 58%, 73%, 78%, 61%, 79% , 78% and 92%
respectively. This study clearly shows that Typha Latifolia that can be grown very easily
under many environmental and climatic factors and mostly available in natural wetland
systems in the area and be applied for the treatment of municipal wastewater in Baticaloa
area in Sri Lanka
