Heavy metals and nutrients released from diffuse sources by urban and agricultural runoff are important pollutants causing aquatic toxicity and/or eutrophication in water bodies. Diffuse source pollution is difficult to address because of the dispersed and often dynamic nature of the flows, which often lead to economic impracticality of traditional approaches.

Beneficial use of industrial and agricultural byproducts as amendments or media/barriers to treat diffuse source pollution can provide cost-effective solutions over various ranges of pollutants and flows. Two applications of this concept were examined in this research study: 1) Immobilization of phosphorus using Fe/Mn inorganic materials and an anaerobic incubation process; (2) Heavy metal removal from roof/wall runoff using a Biomat barrier supplemented with compost and inorganic byproducts.

Through the first study, three different low cost Fe/Mn-rich materials (iron ore, steel slag and Mn tailings) were evaluated as amendments to decrease phosphorus mobility from manure.  Anaerobic incubation of fresh dairy manure with the Fe/Mn rich materials was also evaluated.  Steel slag addition significantly decreased water soluble phosphorus by 93% and Mehlich III extracted phosphorus by 80%, compared to manure-only control. An anaerobic incubation of manure with Fe ore decreased 62% water extractable P compared to fresh manure and 76% compared to incubated manure, due to oxalate extractable Fe (considered as amorphous Fe) increase. This work suggests possible anaerobic incubation use for non-active crystalline byproducts to decrease P loss from manure.

Through the second study, the feasibility of Biomat use, a mixture of sand, compost and inorganic byproducts, was evaluated through column and bench-scale experiments to remove dissolved heavy metals.  A 25% grass/food waste compost + steel slag + sand column was the best media, not only demonstrating excellent metal removals from diffuse sources but also exhibiting the immobility of sorbed metals on the media. Throughout bench scale experiments, hydraulic characteristics and heavy metal removal performance of the mat media were evaluated in perpendicular flow.  After all bench scale experiments, metal extractions showed performed very limited metal mobility in the media.  Design parameters, implementations, and recommendations for future full scale Biomat application in a field were established.