(63o) Municipal Wastewater: Source of Oil Production

Oleaginous microorganisms can produce up to 70 percent of their body weight in oil, thus a potential source of oil for biofuel production. A growth medium that has not been utilized for cultivating oleaginous microorganisms is municipal wastewater. However, the wastewater influent contains indigenous microorganisms that could inhibit the growth and oil production of these oleaginous microorganisms. This study is designed to determine the survivability of the oleaginous microorganism consortium cultivated on primary effluent wastewater amended with synthetic lignocellulosic sugars. Preliminary results have shown that these microorganisms reach stationary phase as well as a maximum cell concentration of 0.6g/L within 24 hours of cultivation. The added amount of glucose was consumed within 8 hours of cultivation. Since indigenous microorganisms were present, a plate count method was utilized to enumerate yeast, which makes up 90% of the consortium. The plate count yielded a significant amount of yeast colony forming units, which is significantly higher than the number of yeast colony forming units in raw wastewater. Future works will entail creating an upscale system to cultivate these microorganisms on municipal wastewater in 10L bioreactors. With this upscale, the full potential of producing oil while treating the wastewater can be determined.