MONITORING THE EFFICACY OF BIOREMEDIATION

The general acceptance of bioremediation technology as an environmenta lly sound and economic treatment for hazardous waste requires the demo nstration of its efficacy, reliability and predictability, as well as its advantages over conventional treatments. An effective monitoring d esign includes protocols for treatment-specific, representative sampli ng, control and monitoring: these should take into account abiotic and biotic pollutant fate processes in all relevant process compartments. A number of well-established and novel chemical and molecular biologi cal monitoring techniques and parameters are available. Logical and ba lanced combinations of both chemical and biological monitoring paramet ers should be used to demonstrate complete degradation and detoxificat ion of a hazardous waste as well as the biological nature of the proce ss. At each process-scale level, a set of general criteria should be u sed for a systematic evaluation of the overall efficacy of bioremediat ion.