Designing Collection Well for Oil Spill Cleanup and Recovery by using Hydrophobic/Oleophilic Fabric Membranes

Hydrophobic/oleophilic polyester fabric membranes prepared by a simple waterborne polymeric nanoparticle coating process were used to build up oil collection wells for the oil spill over water surface. In order that mass flux and separation time can be predicted, a simulation of oil flow through the wall of collection well in a simple and small apparatus was made. The developed model along with the experimental data analysis was shown to enable the characterization of membrane performance by a membrane resistance, R M , to the Poiseuille flow of a liquid oil driven by gravity. A hydrophobic/oleophilic fabric membrane with a specific R M value can then be used to accomplish oil spill cleanup and recovery with predictable separation time. The agreement between theoretical and experimental results confirmed the validity of the developed theoretical model. Moreover, the derived equations predict adequately the performance of oil collection wells and show insight into the design of large-scale oil spill cleanup systems in the potential applications. Finally two oil collection well designs, for example, were demonstrated for the in situ cleanup and recovery of spill oil over water surface of a standard swimming pool with different well allocation, size, and separation time.

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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The datasets used in this study are openly available at [repository link] and the source code is available on GitHub at [GitHub link].