Ozonation Treatment for Offshore Produced Water Effluents

To meet increasingly stringent guidelines for offshore wastewater disposal, new technologies are being considered by Canada’s petroleum industries for the treatment of produced water (PW) effluents. The purpose of the proposed project is to test the effectiveness of ozonation and enhanced approaches for treating PW effluents. Lab-scale, bench-top experiments using a specially designed bubble column as the reaction chamber will be used to test the efficiency of ozonation and the influencing factors (e.g., bubble size, dosage, time), as well as enhanced options by UV irradiation. The reaction dynamics will be studied by determining the kinetics order and reaction rate to understand the mechanisms involved and to improve performance. The toxicity of treated effluent and the influence of ozonation on biodegradability will be examined. Results will provide the offshore petroleum industry with valuable information about the effectiveness of enhanced ozonation as a cost-effective treatment option for PW effluents and will improve their waste management capacity.

This research project was undertaken and completed with a grant from and the financial assistance of Petroleum Research Newfoundland & Labrador.

Faculty Supervisor:

Bing Chen, Baiyu Zhang, Tahir Husain

Student:

Jisi Zheng, Bo Liu, Zelin Li, Yinchen Ma

Partner:

Suncor Energy Inc.

Discipline:

Engineering

Sector:

Energy

University: