The Study of Oil/Water Separation in Emulsion by Membrane Technology SPE 69554
Fernández, Laura G. Soria, Carlos O. García Tourn, Carolina A. Sánchez Izquierdo, María
The Study of Oil/Water Separation in Emulsion by Membrane Technology SPE 69554 - Dallas, Texas Society of Petroleum Engineers 2001 - Fernández, Laura G. .
Water treatment plants use conventional processes like hydrocyclones and air up-floating equipment to separate oil from water. However, these devices are not effective at removing oil drops with small diameters. In this work, the use of membranes to treat oil-water emulsions is analyzed. The performance of microfiltration ceramic and ultrafiltration polysulfone membrane in laboratory scale is studied. Drop of less than 50 µm diameters is the subject of our interest. The new European standards will require less than 10 ppm hydrocarbons. Such standards could easily be met by using membrane technology. The most serious limitation of this technology is a continuous permeation flux decrease due to fouling, which is associated with different membrane-solute interactions, operation conditions, transmembrane pressure, temperature, etc. Emulsions with different concentrations (1000, 500 and 250 ppm) and different droplet sizes are studied. These emulsions are synthesized and characterized in the laboratory. The results found for different nominal molecular weight cut-off, membrane materials and operation condition permit to analyze whether this alternative technology is suitable to solve a separation problem, which is of great environmental interest.
The Study of Oil/Water Separation in Emulsion by Membrane Technology SPE 69554 - Dallas, Texas Society of Petroleum Engineers 2001 - Fernández, Laura G. .
Water treatment plants use conventional processes like hydrocyclones and air up-floating equipment to separate oil from water. However, these devices are not effective at removing oil drops with small diameters. In this work, the use of membranes to treat oil-water emulsions is analyzed. The performance of microfiltration ceramic and ultrafiltration polysulfone membrane in laboratory scale is studied. Drop of less than 50 µm diameters is the subject of our interest. The new European standards will require less than 10 ppm hydrocarbons. Such standards could easily be met by using membrane technology. The most serious limitation of this technology is a continuous permeation flux decrease due to fouling, which is associated with different membrane-solute interactions, operation conditions, transmembrane pressure, temperature, etc. Emulsions with different concentrations (1000, 500 and 250 ppm) and different droplet sizes are studied. These emulsions are synthesized and characterized in the laboratory. The results found for different nominal molecular weight cut-off, membrane materials and operation condition permit to analyze whether this alternative technology is suitable to solve a separation problem, which is of great environmental interest.
