摘要：Studies were conducted to evaluate the feasibility of bioconversion of pulp and paperindustry secondary treatment sludge with sawdust under aerobic conditions. Thecomposting of the waste was carried out for a period of 90 days by mixing pulp andpaper industry sludge (PS) with sawdust (SD) in the ratio of 3:1 and inoculating treatment1 (T 1 ) with only cow dung whereas inoculating the treatment 2 (T 2 ) with cow dung andeffective microorganisms (EM). The composting process showed satisfactory resultswith the cow dung and effective microorganism inoculum, i.e., Treatment 2 (T 2 ). Thedifferent chemical parameters like pH, EC, temperature and C:N ratio were analysedduring the composting period. The C:N ratio showed a gradual decrease from 36.12 to21.02 and 38.30 to 17.63 for T 1 and T 2 respectively on the 90 th day of composting. ThepH varied from 6.5 to 7.3 and from 6.8 to 7.6 in T 1 and T 2 respectively indicating a goodcompost quality. The EC values decreased gradually from 2.3 µmhos/cm and reachedthe value 1.2 µmhos/cm in both the treatments. The nutrient values like NPK werealmost equal in both the treatments i.e. Though the nutrients levels were equal, theTreatment 2 (T 2 ) reached the compost stability at the 90 th day whereas the Treatment1 has not reached the stability or maturity at the 90 th day, which is indicated by the C:Nratio. Therefore, it can be concluded that the pulp and paper industry sludge (PS) canbe successfully converted into value added compost in the period of 90 days by co-composting with sawdust (SD) in the ratio of 3:1 and by mixing with cowdung (CD) +effective microorganisms (EM) as inoculum.
