Development of Novel Nano-Engineered Surfaces for Efficient Oil-Water Separation and disinfection of Sulfate Reducing Bacteria

Oil and gas extraction activities result in the production of large volumes of wastewater. These waters are usually very saline (> 100,000 ppm) and contaminated with oil a...and pathogens such as sulphate-reducing bacteria. Standard reverse osmosis purification is challenged in dealing with these waters, because the membranes cannot tolerate oil and high salinities raise osmotic pressure beyond the normal operating conditions of the technology. The treatment and disposal or reuse of this water is thus challenging, and it requires a multi-staged process in which oil is separated and recovered prior to the removal of contaminants from the water. The proposed research will focus mainly on oil/water separation as the presence of oil is the major obstacle for potential reuse. Removal of other contaminants such as sulphate-reducing bacteria (SRB) will be a point of secondary focus. Water produced during oil production in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will be a particular focus, but worldwide conditions will also be considered. Novel and fairly simple techniques such as spray coating and layer by layer deposition will be used to prepare surfaces that are hydrophilic and oleophobic at the same time. The fabricated surfaces will then be characterized for their morphology, topology and water-repellency using state of the art tools. Finally, standard oil/water separation studies will be carried out to determine the effectiveness of the synthesized material for the proposed task. For disinfection of Sulphate reducing bacteria (SRB), advanced oxidation methods based on photocatalysis will be employed. Novel Nanoparticles of metal oxides will be synthesized using simple and cost effective techniques. The nanoengineered materials will then be incorporated in a solar-based photocatalytic reactor to carry out the disinfection of SRB.