Bio-remediation with Compost & Fungus

by Emily Fitzgerald, Education Coordinator of Microbial Earth

 We believe that we can heal the land in our own backyards with the help of Microbes and fungi.  In the last newsletter we overviewed the benefits of Mycorrhizae and the necessity of microbes.  The broader environmental community is talking about the potential of microbes and fungi to clean up the biggest oil spill ever.  Recently an article was published by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Research Service, where they experimented with using compost to remove three different types of commonly spilled hydrocarbons, including motor oil, diesel and gasoline.  Research shows that compost has the ability to remove oil from water and thus break down the hydrocarbons.  Bioremediation takes far less time with compost than under natural conditions due to the increase in diversity and population of Microbes in compost.