Shifts in microbial communities in bioaugmented grease interceptors removing fat, oil, and grease (FOG)

To understand the effect of daily bioaugmentation in full-scale grease interceptors (GIs), we compared the microbial communities occurring in two full-scale GIs during bioaugmented and non-bioaugmented cycles. The changes in microbial communities were determined using terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism (T-RFLP) and 16S rRNA gene clone library construction. Differences in the microbial community structure between control and bioaugmented cycles were observed in all cases, although the dominant terminal restriction fragments in the biological product were not detected. The addition of bioaugmentation products and changes in the GI microbial ecology were related to differences in GI performance. Understanding the shifts due to bioaugmentation will result in more informed assessments of the benefits of bioadditives on FOG removal in GIs as well as the effects on downstream sewer lines.