Behaviour of cyanobacterial bloom material following coagulation and/or sedimentation

Abstract

The global increase in detection of cyanobacteria and their metabolites has prompted greater emphasis in optimizing water treatment options for their effective removal. In particular, conventional coagulation and clarification processes have been shown to be effective in removing whole cyanobacterial cells, and consequently a majority of the metabolites. However, the resultant cyanobacterial-laden sludge is often not closely monitored in treatment plants. This study has shown that the sludge supernatant derived from the coagulation/sedimentation of a range of natural cyanobacterial blooms contained extremely high concentrations of metabolites (up to ~8,000 ng L-1 of geosmin and ~90 μg L-1 of..