De-emulsification of Water-in-Oil Dispersions Using Electric Fields

Research Assistant: Li Bin
Principal Investigator: Prof. Mojtaba Ghadiri
Sponsor: CSC (China Scholarship Council)
Status: Ongoing (2016 – ) Abstract In a number of industrial processes, efficient and rapid separation of a dispersed liquid phase from a continuous phase such as the water-in-oil emulsion is highly desirable. For example, crude oil containing finely dispersed water droplets making the separation very difficult and slow, causing complications and detrimental production consequences. The development of an efficient technology for removing and eliminating the dispersed water phase from the crude oil is therefore highly warranted. A number of techniques are available for breaking liquid-liquid dispersions. The use of high electric fields has been shown to be effective in the separation of water droplets from oils and has many advantages over other methods, such as low operating cost, non-intrusive, no contamination and high efficiency.

The proposed work will have two main objectives while addressing the role of externally applied electric fields on the behaviour of oil/water systems: (i) studies of the electrocoalescence behaviour of water droplets stabilized by solid particles to form Pickering emulsions and in solution with salts, in order to mimic the conditions found during crude oil extraction; (ii) further development and optimisation of compact electro-coalescers for treatment of crude oil.