Authors: Roberto S Fernandes Gaspar González Elizabete F Lucas
Publish Date: 2004/07/07
Volume: 283, Issue: 2, Pages: 219-224
Abstract
During oil production and treatment oilinwater O/W emulsions are formed These dispersions require treatment prior to disposal In order to improve oil/water separation processes through any physical process decanting flotation centrifuging etc the particle size of the dispersed phase should be increased This may be obtained by a flocculation process which consists in the agglomeration of several particles or drops using as flocculating agent hydrophilic high molecular weight macromolecules Poly ethylenebpropylene oxide and poly vinyl alcohol polymers have been evaluated as flocculating agents for oily water systems Their performance is related to the particle size increase of the dispersed phase In this work a photometric dispersion analyzer PDA has been used to accomplish the oil drop agglomeration Synthetic as well as produced water was used Data are in good agreement with previous tests Qualitative information related to aggregates or particle size distribution of the oily water systems can be obtained using PDA
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