Treatment of synthetic acid mine drainage using rice wine waste as a carbon source

Spent mushroom compost (SMC) is commonly used as a carbon source for passive treatment systems in South Korea; however, it has some drawbacks, such as sulfate release from itself. Consequently, investigations to identify effective substitutes for SMC are necessary. In this study, batch experiments were conducted for 27 days to evaluate the efficiency of rice wine waste (RWW) for reducing sulfate and removing dissolved metals within synthetic acid mine drainage (AMD). The results showed that RWW could be more suitable than SMC, which even released sulfate in the early stage of the experiment, for sulfate reduction by sulfate-reducing bacteria. Both materials produced similar results with respect to the removal of dissolved metals, such as Fe and Al. Furthermore, a mixture of SMC and RWW showed the greatest efficiency in sulfate removal. Overall, both RWW and the mixed carbon source showed comparable performance to SMC, which indicated that RWW had a great potential for use as a carbon source for AMD treatment.