MORPHOLOGICAL CHARACTERISTICS OF TOMATO IRRIGATED WITH WASTEWATERS WITH DIFFERENT OXYGEN CONCENTRATIONS

Abstract

Water scarcity is an ever-aggravating problem worldwide. In particular, there is greater emphasis placed on arid and semi-arid regions like Turkey. Although quite much progress have been achieved, several countries today are still faced to imbalanced water demands and water supplies especially in summer periods due to simultaneous low precipitations, high evaporations and increasing demands for irrigation. Major portion of irrigated agriculture is supported by fresh irrigation water resources, which are surface and groundwater. Not surprisingly, the decrease in natural water resources caused by drought and population growth enforced authorities to establish and to encourage the reuse of wastewater. In this study, different hygiene treatments (control, activated carbon treatment, activated carbon+hydrogen peroxide treatment, ozone treatment and hydrogen peroxide treatment) were used for the effluent of Ankara Municipal Wastewater Treatment Plant. Following hygiene treatments, wastewater was used as irrigation water for tomato. The oxygen concentration was achieved as 10 mg/l in all treatments. Oxygen treated wastewater had significant positive influences on some morphological characteristics of tomato.

Keywords

• waste water
• irrigation
• oxygen
• tomato