Nutrimensâ„¢

The Product

Nutrimensâ„¢ provides reduced carbon and a wide array of beneficial vitamins, minerals, and metabolites to microbes for enhanced bioremediation of contaminated sites. It can be utilized in groundwater remediation efforts using the liquid or granular formulation or in bioreactors and constructed wetland treatment systems to improve remediation of effluents and surface waters for various metals. Nutrimensâ„¢ increases removal rates of many priority pollutants and aids in maintaining circumneutral pH.

Enhancing the Efficiency of Electron Donor Utilization in Bioremediation

The use of carbon substrates as electron donors to enhance reductive dechlorination has been commercially used to remediate chemical contaminants since at least the early1990′s. To reduce costs, many in the industry have moved toward cheaper, less refined substrates, which alone may show poor kinetics and low efficiency.

Thus, at many sites, a common technological challenge is maintaining sufficient nutrient concentrations to support biomass growth as well as contaminant and substrate metabolism. We encourage our clients to include monitoring of groundwater nutrient levels and measurement of substrate utilization rates as indicators of in situ biological activity.

Addition of nutrients can facilitate the remediation process. Relative ratios of nutrients favorable for natural degradation are in the order of 100 Carbon / 10 Nitrogen / 1 Phosphorous / 1 Potassium / 1 Sulfur. This also means that microbes rely on the C:N ratio to break down organic contaminants. A lower carbon to nitrogen ratio is one of the indications that necessary degradation times can be reduced. Nutrimensâ„¢ liquid, which has over 12% of total carbon to help reduce the amount of additional substrate required, can add more than 6 g/kg of TKN as well as 2.9 g/km of Total Phosphorus.

Some practitioners add yeast extracts to promote the activity of contaminant degrading bacteria in bioremediation of halogenated hydrocarbon-impacted groundwater. However, we are not aware of evidence that supports the claim that yeast extract enhances the efficiency of electron donor utilization in bioremediation.

Our Nutrimensâ„¢ product is a better choice than yeast extract. Besides its role in increasing the rates of bioremediation, addition of Nutrimensâ„¢ increases the efficiency of electron donor utilization. Nutrimensâ„¢ provides a source of sugars, proteins, vitamins and amino acids contained in yeast cells and extracellular metabolites which will decrease the remediation time. In addition, Nutrimensâ„¢ has also been demonstrated to aid in maintaining circumneutral pH.

Many practitioners simply add Nutrimensâ„¢ to contaminated environments to improve microbial treatment of the contaminated material. Nutrimensâ„¢ works with microbes and electron donors to improve the rate of degradation of the contaminant making the remedy faster, better, and cheaper.