SNOW HILL, NC - Paul Skillicorn spreads the root and tiny
green leaves of one of the world's smallest flowering plants, which
he thinks may be the answer to problem hog lagoons and aging
wastewater treatment systems.

Skillicorn, who spent nearly a decade teaching Third World communities how to harvest duckweed for a profit, told The Associated Press the plants absorb pollution-causing nutrients from waste. The plants then can be harvested, dried and used for animal feed.

Duckweed refers to species of free-floating, stemless aquatic plants touted for their uses in waste treatment, animal feed and pharmaceuticals.

The swine industry has shown little interest so far in Skillicorn's ideas although he has a makeshift duckweed system at one hog farm in Greene County. But the Greene County town of Hookerton, faced with a $2 million price tag to pipe its waste 10 miles to Snow Hill, does want to test the idea.

While obstacles remain, a $790,000 state grant is waiting for Hookerton to become the first municipality in North Carolina to become reliant on a duckweed system.

Hookerton's current three-lagoon system becomes less efficient in killing algae and bacteria when lagoons grow warmer in the summer, and it has paid the price.

Skillicorn recommended that Hookerton install 26 greenhouses,each 100-feet-by-15 feet. Untreated waste from the first lagoon would enter the greenhouses, where duckweed would feed off nutrients in the waste, growing rapidly.

Nutrients dumped into rivers and streams generate algae blooms that rob waters of oxygen, hurting plant and animal life. But under Skillicorn's plan,
duckweed would break down the nutrients while removing those pollutants from the water.

Workers would harvest duckweed and take it to a farm to dry out, in the process killing any pathogens that remain. The resulting olive-green material would be sold to feed operators for livestock.

Administrative costs would be about $30,000 a year, and the capital cost would be a third the cost of piping Hookerton's waste to Snow Hill, Skillicorn said.

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