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New Energy Efficient Method for Cleaning Oilfield Brines with Carbon Dioxide
Abstract
Water contaminated with hydrocarbons often
results during the production of oil. The polluted
water, which may be naturally occurring or a result
of water or steam flooding operations, must be
cleaned before disposal or re-injection. These
brines are usually contaminated with emulsified oil
droplets, 2 - 10 microns in diameter. Conventional
phase separation techniques are often inadequate in
cleaning such waters. Presently, gas floatation
combined with chemical additives to promote oil
droplet flocculation are used to purify these
waters. However, if stricter discharge limits are
imposed by the Environmental Protection Agency, the
gas flotation method is likely to be inadequate.
A new process was developed which utilizes
carbon dioxide to clean oilfield brines. The new
treatment method, described in this work, is
actually an enhancement of existing gas flotation
technology. The enhancement results from the use
of carbon dioxide as the sweeping gas combined with
its ability to lower the pH of the aqueous system.
The reduction of pH neutralizes the charge on the
surface of the drop, thus de-stabilizing the
emulsion and enhancing phase separation. The water
is simply neutralized by flashing the treated water
to ambient pressure. The important discoveries of
this study and an economic comparison of the carbon
dioxide treatment process with other potential
processes are presented in this paper.
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Citation
Little, C. T.; Seibert, A. F.; Bravo, J. L.; Fair, J. R. (1991). New Energy Efficient Method for Cleaning Oilfield Brines with Carbon Dioxide. Energy Systems Laboratory (http://esl.eslwin.tamu.edu). Available electronically from https : / /hdl .handle .net /1969 .1 /92243.