WO1994003250A1 - Procede et appareil d'elimination des depots d'un melange - Google Patents

Procede et appareil d'elimination des depots d'un melange

Info

Publication number
WO1994003250A1
WO1994003250A1 PCT/EP1993/002007 EP9302007W WO9403250A1 WO 1994003250 A1 WO1994003250 A1 WO 1994003250A1 EP 9302007 W EP9302007 W EP 9302007W WO 9403250 A1 WO9403250 A1 WO 9403250A1
Authority
WO
WIPO (PCT)
Prior art keywords
particles
filter bed
filter
mixture
vessel
Prior art date
Application number
PCT/EP1993/002007
Other languages
English (en)
Inventor
Abele Broer Van Der Meer
Original Assignee
Akzo Nobel N.V.
Priority date (The priority date is an assumption and is not a legal conclusion. Google has not performed a legal analysis and makes no representation as to the accuracy of the date listed.)
Filing date
Publication date
Application filed by Akzo Nobel N.V. filed Critical Akzo Nobel N.V.
Priority to AU47035/93A priority Critical patent/AU4703593A/en
Priority to EP93917675A priority patent/EP0653951A1/fr
Priority to JP6504975A priority patent/JPH07509653A/ja
Publication of WO1994003250A1 publication Critical patent/WO1994003250A1/fr

Links

Classifications

    • B—PERFORMING OPERATIONS; TRANSPORTING
    • B01—PHYSICAL OR CHEMICAL PROCESSES OR APPARATUS IN GENERAL
    • B01D—SEPARATION
    • B01D24/00—Filters comprising loose filtering material, i.e. filtering material without any binder between the individual particles or fibres thereof
    • B01D24/36—Filters comprising loose filtering material, i.e. filtering material without any binder between the individual particles or fibres thereof with the filter bed fluidised during the filtration

Definitions

  • the invention relates to a process for removing bottoms or isolating useful products from a liquid mixture which in addition to, e.g., water contains solid matter, in which process the mixture is passed through a packed filter bed in a vessel.
  • the invention further comprises an apparatus for working said process.
  • waste matter In the recovery of petroleum and gas large quantities of waste matter are obtained in addition to the main product of oil or gas. A major portion of this waste matter takes the form of so-called production water, which is a mixture composed for the most part of a carrier liquid in the form of water containing said bottoms, such as a few thousand pp of oil and a few hundred pp of solids, such as sand, heavy metals, radioactive material or the like. Needless to say, with the present strict environmental requirements said waste matter increasingly comes to be problem. A problem is constituted- in particular by the aforementioned production water, since in that case usually a mixture of water, oil, and solids is involved.
  • a process of the type mentioned in the opening paragraph is known from GB Patent Specification 1445692, where a mixture in the form of a water, oil, and solids-containing dispersion is passed through a densely packed filter bed, the solid matter being retained in the filter bed while the oil and the water flow through the filter and separate to collect at different levels as determined by their relative densities. Next, the separated oil and water layers are discharged individually. In this process the filter becomes saturated with solids after some time, whereupon the feeding of the aforementioned mixture is stopped and the filter is washed out with washing water, the washing out being simplified by the rinsing water fluidising the filter elements.
  • the filter is composed of lengths of tubular knitted mesh structures composed of stainless steel wires and polypropylene filaments.
  • the mixture to be treated can be supplied only at a comparatively low rate.
  • a too high feeding rate would cause the fiuidisation of the filter bed sections, which would prevent proper separation of the oil and the water into individual layers and would render the separate discharge of oil and water impossible, in other words, at higher feeding rates the known process ceases to function in a satisfactory manner.
  • the known system functions well enough initially, but because.of the densely packed filter bed employed in the process clogging will occur comparatively quickly due to caking of the filter bed, whereupon the process must be stopped.
  • the invention has for its object to provide a process of the type mentioned in the opening paragraph in which said drawbacks have-been obviated, which will enable large quantities of mixture in the form of said production water supplied at a comparatively high rate to be treated, and in which bottoms, such as especially oil or other hydrocarbons, may be removed from the mixture virtually completely.
  • the process according to the invention is first of all characterised in that the filter bed is composed of bottoms- or useful products- absorbing filter particles and situated in such a space that, when the greater part of any present solid matter is passed through it, expansion or fiuidisation of the filter bed may occur as the pressure in it increases during operation.
  • the filter particles are bottoms-absorbing filter particles, such as as polymer particles, of which the specific weight is lower than that of the supplied mixture, and the supplied mixture is passed through the filter bed essentially from the top downwards, such that during operation a buffer volume essentially composed of the carrier liquid, e.g., water, is present between the bottom of the filter bed and the bottom end of the vessel provided with an outlet for the mixture treated in the filter bed.
  • the carrier liquid e.g., water
  • the filter bed used according to the invention essentially contains filter particles, such as polymer particles, of a size in the range of 50 ⁇ m to 5000 ⁇ m, preference being given to the use of 25 polymer particles made of polyolefin, in particular polypropylene.
  • the polymer particles used preferably are porous particles having pores with an average diameter in the range of 0,1 ⁇ m to 50 ⁇ , which pores are interconnected and make up 10 to 90 , ⁇ vol.%, preferably 60 to 90 vol .%, of the particles.
  • the pores are filled wholly or in part with an extracting agent composed of a hydrophobic substance exhibiting great affinity for the constituents to be extracted from the water.
  • advantageous use may be made in the filter bed of polymer particles of the type manufactured by cooling a solution composed of a polymer and a substance inert to said polymer down to the temperature range in which decomposition occurs and to below the temperature at which the polymer solidifies, optionally with the porous polymer being reduced to the desired particle size and followed by washing out of the inert substance if so desired.
  • a filter bed essentially composed of polymer particles, such as polystyrene particles, which respond to contact with hydrocarbons, such as benzene, by swelling.
  • a process in which the supplied mixture also contains solid particles enclosed in hydrocarbons, such as oil, is characterised according to the invention in that such a treatment is carried out in the filter bed that solid particles present in the treated liquid downstream of the filter bed are virtually free of hydrocarbons.
  • This is of major importance in actual practice because, as a result, the solid matter from which oil or the like has been removed can easily be separated from the water at a later stage, e.g., by means of centrifuging or precipitation.
  • porous polymer particles described herein, their manufacturing process, and their use as oil absorbents are known as such, in principle, from DE 2 737 745, DE 2833623, US 4454 198, US 4379860, and US 4391 920 in the name of Akzo.
  • the invention further comprises an apparatus for carrying out the process described hereinbefore, said apparatus having a treatment vessel with an inlet and an outlet, with the vessel containing a filter bed, and being characterised in that the treatment vessel is positioned essentially vertically, with the inlet at the one end, preferably the upper end, of the vessel and the outlet at the other end, preferably the lower end, of the vessel, the vessel preferably has an expanding cross-section from the top downwards, and the filter bed is composed of a plurality of filter particles, such as polymer particles, having a density smaller than that of the supplied mixture, preferably smaller than 1.
  • the filter bed in that case also may essentially be composed of filter particles containing a plurality of void spaces, said void spaces being wholly or partially filled or not with an extracting agent for the extraction of hydrocarbons dissolved in the water.
  • the filter bed may essentially be composed of polymer particles, such as polystyrene particles, which respond to contact with hydrocarbons, such as benzene, by swelling.
  • a vessel through which the mixture to be treated flows in essentially vertical direction preference is given to a vessel through which the mixture to be treated flows in essentially vertical direction.
  • Use is preferably made in this case of a cylindrical vessel of virtually even cross-section in the mixture's direction of flow, or of a vessel of widening cross-section in the direction of flow of the mixture, preferably a conical vessel.
  • the process according to the invention makes it possible for bottoms, such as oil, to be removed from a large quantity of said mixture per unit of time, while any solids present are mostly passed through, thus greatly simplifying the subsequent processing of the saturated filter bed material.
  • the filter particles used in the filter bed are capable of rapid and complete absorption of the oil from the mixture.
  • highly porous filter particles may be employed in the filter bed, it is capable of absorbing a large volume of oil.
  • the flow through the vessel is vertically from the top downwards and when use is made of a filter bed composed of filter particles of a density smaller than that of the supplied mixture, preferably smaller than 1, an especially favourable effect is achieved.
  • the filter bed will be situated as much as possible in the upper section of the treatment vessel, while beneath the filter bed there will be a buffer volume essentially composed of water which contains virtually no filter particles at all. Clogging of the filter bed is all but excluded in this process, since the filter expands as the pressure rises.
  • the process in addition is less susceptible to the generally unavoidable fluctuations in the feeding rate of the mixture. Furthermore, the lower speed in the bottom section of the filter bed acts as a safeguard against the smallest filter particles being washed out.
  • the moment of saturation of the filter bed can easily be determined by measuring the oil content or the hydrocarbons content of the mixture discharged from the vessel. When such a measurement shows that the hydrocarbons content or the oil content of the discharged mixture exceeds a predetermined value of, say, 0-40 ppm, then the supply of mixture to the treatment vessel in question can be stopped and a_ change-over made to a next vessel containing a fresh filter bed.
  • Fig. 1 is a view of the treatment vessel with an expanded filter bed
  • Fig. 2 is a view of the treatment vessel with a fluidised filter bed
  • Fig. 3 is a view of a conical treatment vessel with a fluidised filter bed.
  • Fig. 1 the aforementioned treatment vessel is indicated in general with 1.
  • the vessel 1 is in the vertical position during operation and is cylindrical, i.e., it is of even cross-section along its entire height.
  • a filter bed 2 which is situated in the upper section of the vessel since the porous polypropylene particles which make up the filter bed are lighter than the supplied mixture.
  • said mixture of, e.g., water, oil, and solids which is to be treated is supplied along the direction of the arrow 3. Because of the selected feeding rate of the mixture, the filter bed 2 is expanded such that it extends across the area of the vessel 1 indicated with 4.
  • Fig. 2 depicts the process according to the invention with a rate of feeding of the mixture to be treated being employed which is so much higher that the polymer particles in the filter bed form a bed
  • Fig. 3 depicts the process according to the invention in which use is made of a vertically positioned conical treatment vessel 1, with corresponding parts once again being indicated with the same reference numerals.
  • the cone For easy to use systems it is recommended for the cone to
  • ? have a fictitious apex angle of less than 30°.
  • the aforementioned mixture is supplied from the top along the arrow 3 at such a high rate that the filter bed 2 composed of porous polypropylene particles extending across the area 4 is fluidised in its entirety. Due to the increase in the cross-section of the vessel 1 in the direction of flow
  • An experiment using the process according to the invention employed an apparatus of the type shown in Fig. 3 with a conical treatment vessel in the form of a truncated cone with a vertical axis, with a fictitious apex angle of 15° for the conical shape, an upper surface of 0,05 in diameter, a lower surface of 0,60 m in diameter, and a height of 2,12 .
  • the mixture to be treated was fed to the top of the vessel, while the treated mixture was discharged from the bottom of the vessel.
  • the supplied mixture was composed of water containing: 150 ppm of oil (°56 API) 100 ppm of solids (silicon dioxide having an average particle diameter of 50 ⁇ m) 100 ppm of surface-active material (triethylene glycol) 20 ppm of anti-corrosion agent (based on an aminoamide compound) 10000 ppm of NaCl .
  • the rate of flow of the supplied mixture was 0,9 ⁇ h.
  • the filter bed was made up of 2 kg of polymer particles of macroporous polypropylene of the following specifications: particle diameter 350-1000 ⁇ m porosity 3 ml/g average pore diameter 10 ⁇ m
  • the temperature of the liquid in the treatment vessel was 20°C.
  • the process according to the invention for isolating biological products from fermentation mixtures.
  • Conventional isolation of biological products, such as proteins, from fermentation mixtures is by adsorption, with the component to be isolated being selectively adsorbed by solid particles in a packed bed.
  • a major drawback to this known separating technique is that the column becomes clogged comparatively quickly owing to the accumulation of solid impurities (cell residues) in the column.
  • Use of the process according to the invention permits continuous adsorption without clogging, with the desired biological products being absorbed by the filter particles. In this process, therefore, the desired biological products constitute the bottoms to be removed from the mixture.
  • Use of the process according to the invention will give a substantial reduction of the cost of isolating and purifying biological products, which is of major importance given that these costs may amount to half or more than half of the overall production costs when the conventional process is used.
  • the bottoms removed from the mixture may be a useful and serviceable product as well as waste matter.
  • the invention is directed primarily to removing liquid or gaseous bottoms, especially hydrocarbons, such as oil, from a liquid mixture.
  • the bottoms to be removed also may be solid.
  • An alternative favourable embodiment of the process is characterised according to the invention in that a vessel is employed through which the mixture essentially flows in vertical direction, filter particles, such as polymer particles, which have a greater density than the supplied mixture are used for the filter bed, and the supplied mixture is passed through the filter bed essentially from the bottom upwards, such that during operation a buffer volume essentially composed of the treated, bottoms-poor mixture is present between the top of the filter bed and the top end of the vessel provided with an outlet for the mixture treated in the filter bed.
  • ppm is an abbreviation of parts per million.
  • 1 ppm of hydrocarbon or oil or solid matter in the aforementioned mixture means, 1.10 -6 parts by weight of this substance for 1 part by weight of the mixture.
  • oil in the description first and foremost refers to substances based on refined or unrefined mineral oil.

Landscapes

  • Chemical & Material Sciences (AREA)
  • Chemical Kinetics & Catalysis (AREA)
  • Treatment Of Liquids With Adsorbents In General (AREA)
  • Water Treatment By Sorption (AREA)

Abstract

Procédé d'élimination des dépôts ou d'isolement de produits utilies d'un mélange liquide, lequel, par exemple, en plus de l'eau contient des matières solides, consistant à faire passer le mélange dans un lit filtrant compact situé dans une cuve, caractérisé en ce que le lit filtrant est composé de dépôts et de particules de filtrage absorbant le produit utile, et situé dans un espace de manière que, lorsque la plus grande partie des éventuelles matières solides présentes ou analogues l'a traversé, l'expansion ou la fluidisation du lit filtrant peut avoir lieu puisque la pression y régnant augmente pendant le fonctionnement.
PCT/EP1993/002007 1992-08-07 1993-07-28 Procede et appareil d'elimination des depots d'un melange WO1994003250A1 (fr)

Priority Applications (3)

Application Number Priority Date Filing Date Title
AU47035/93A AU4703593A (en) 1992-08-07 1993-07-28 Process and apparatus for removing bottoms from a mixture
EP93917675A EP0653951A1 (fr) 1992-08-07 1993-07-28 Procede et appareil d'elimination des depots d'un melange
JP6504975A JPH07509653A (ja) 1992-08-07 1993-07-28 混合物から残留物を除くための方法及び装置

Applications Claiming Priority (2)

Application Number Priority Date Filing Date Title
NL9201419 1992-08-07
NL9201419 1992-08-07

Publications (1)

Publication Number Publication Date
WO1994003250A1 true WO1994003250A1 (fr) 1994-02-17

Family

ID=19861157

Family Applications (1)

Application Number Title Priority Date Filing Date
PCT/EP1993/002007 WO1994003250A1 (fr) 1992-08-07 1993-07-28 Procede et appareil d'elimination des depots d'un melange

Country Status (4)

Country Link
EP (1) EP0653951A1 (fr)
JP (1) JPH07509653A (fr)
AU (1) AU4703593A (fr)
WO (1) WO1994003250A1 (fr)

Cited By (1)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
US10246735B2 (en) 2012-03-30 2019-04-02 Roche Molecular Systems, Inc. Methods for preparing samples for nucleic acid amplification

Citations (5)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
NL6713173A (fr) * 1966-09-28 1968-03-29
NL7403461A (fr) * 1973-03-14 1974-09-17
US4159244A (en) * 1973-03-14 1979-06-26 Kureha Kagaku Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha Waste water-treating method
US4284511A (en) * 1979-08-30 1981-08-18 General Technology Applications, Inc. Process for using magnetically ballasted sorbents
US4420403A (en) * 1982-08-02 1983-12-13 Control Fluidics, Inc. Filter module

Patent Citations (5)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
NL6713173A (fr) * 1966-09-28 1968-03-29
NL7403461A (fr) * 1973-03-14 1974-09-17
US4159244A (en) * 1973-03-14 1979-06-26 Kureha Kagaku Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha Waste water-treating method
US4284511A (en) * 1979-08-30 1981-08-18 General Technology Applications, Inc. Process for using magnetically ballasted sorbents
US4420403A (en) * 1982-08-02 1983-12-13 Control Fluidics, Inc. Filter module

Cited By (1)

* Cited by examiner, † Cited by third party
Publication number Priority date Publication date Assignee Title
US10246735B2 (en) 2012-03-30 2019-04-02 Roche Molecular Systems, Inc. Methods for preparing samples for nucleic acid amplification

Also Published As

Publication number Publication date
EP0653951A1 (fr) 1995-05-24
JPH07509653A (ja) 1995-10-26
AU4703593A (en) 1994-03-03

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