Photo By Lt. Charles Clark | Crude oil mixed with sea water contacts foam pads used as test media at the National...... read more read more
During the week of December 5, 2016, Coast Guard Research and Development Center researchers witnessed the demonstration of an adsorbent foam designed to recover oil in the water column, at the National Oil Spill Response Research and Renewable Energy Test Facility in Leonardo, New Jersey.
This demonstration was the culmination of an 18-month effort with Argonne National Laboratory to promote the development of a technology, technique, or strategy to prevent submerged oil from having further adverse impacts on the environment or manmade structures. As one of the two vendors selected for this project effort, ANL developed a reusable adsorbent foam that is envisioned to be dragged behind a vessel in the water column. It would sweep through an oil plume, then be brought to the surface and the collected oil would be wrung-out into a container. The adsorbent foam is then returned to the water column for further oil recovery.
For the demonstration, ANL used common polyurethane foam as a starting material and coated it with a series of chemical reactions to render it oleophilic, or oil-attracting. ANL created a support frame and attached the adsorbent foam pads to it. The prototype system swept through the water column in the main tank at different speeds. After contact with the oil plume, the system was pulled out of the tank and each foam pad was run through a hand-wringer system. The extracted oil and water were measured for recovery efficiency. Diesel fuel, HOOPS, and Alaska North Slope crude oils were used over the course of the week.
RDC partnered with the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement for this effort.
| Date Taken: | 03.01.2017 |
| Date Posted: | 03.01.2017 17:40 |
| Story ID: | 225390 |
| Location: | LEONARDO, NEW JERSEY, US |
| Web Views: | 82 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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