Authors :

K. Senthilraja*, P. Jothimani and G. Rajannan, P. Jothimani and G. Rajannan

Author Address :

Department of Environmental Sciences, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu - 641 003, India.

Abstract :

Beer is the fifth most consumed beverage in the world. The brewing industry is one of the largest users of water. Even though substantial technological improvements have been made in the past, it has been documented that approximately 3 to 10 litres of wastewater is generated per litre of beer. The crops tested for management of brewery wastewater were maize, sunflower and sesame which had the characteristics of fast growth, high salinity tolerance; potential for producing commercial products such as food grains along with the remediation capability without affecting the food grade. The brewery wastewater was colourless and odourless with neutral in reaction (7.05) having an EC of 1.96 dS m-1. Therefore, the potential of brewery wastewater as an irrigation source for crop production was assessed through pot culture and field experiments. In the pot culture studies, the growth parameters like plant height, stem girth, number of leaves, leaf area, total chlorophyll content, proline, soluble protein and biomass production of maize, sunflower and sesame performed better at higher concentration of brewery wastewater irrigation. The soil enzyme activities showed that increasing the concentration of wastewater lead to increase in enzyme activities of brewery wastewater irrigated soil.

Keywords :

Brewery wastewater, impact, crops and enzyme activity.