Bioremediation of Contaminated Soil with Oils Residuals through Bioaugmentation and Natural Attenuation

The potential for soil contamination by oil spills is growing, due to heavy industrialization and economic development of countries. Due to this fact, the bioremediation has become an alternative to remediate areas through the use of biological agents. Two microorganisms, isolated from a lipid-rich effluent, were used in the bioaugmentation of soils contaminated with diesel oil, lubricating oil and soybean oil. Natural attenuation tests were conducted as controls. The removal of diesel fuel at the time of 21 d were of 18.5%, 7.30% and 11.38%, respectively, for the bioaugmentation with isolated I1 and I2 and natural attenuation. The removal of lubricating oil were 41.6%, 14.16% and 6.91% respectively for the bioaugmentation with the isolated I1 and I2 and natural attenuation, while for soybean oil removals were of 87 8%, 73.9% and 49.4%. Considering the processes of bioaugmentatiom and natural attenuation, the bioaugmentation with the isolated I1 showed better results, possibly due to the production of compounds capable of reducing the surface tension during the preparation of bioaugmentation.