Abatement of oil residues from produced water using a thermocatalytic packed bed reactor

Produced water is a major waste and environmental concern in the oil and gas industry, since it contains dispersed oil and dissolved compounds, which may harm the aquatic environment. Thus, focus on the offshore treatment of the produced water is required. Current methods include hydrocyclones and water clarifiers that cannot achieve full abatement of the oily contaminants. Here we propose a novel thermocatalytic degradation of the dispersed oil using a thermocatalyst, namely Sr0.85Ce0.15FeO3 perovskite that benefits from the thermal energy contained in the produced water, which has temperatures of 40–50 ◦C when reaching the cleaning phase. It is found that the oil is removed faster with higher perovskite concentrations, and the initial removal is mainly adsorption to the perovskite surface followed by catalytic degradation. Based on batch testing, a lab-scale packed bed reactor (PBR) is modelled showing that oil can be continuously removed by sufficient residence time in the reactor.