Abstract
Petroleum storage and refining leads to the generation of undesirable hazardous oily sludge waste stream in considerable quantities. Oily sludge was subjected to hydrothermal carbonization (HTC), in an effort to remediate hazardous waste and enhance resource recovery. Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry and 13C Nuclear Magnetic Resonance were used to determine hydrocarbon fingerprints for degradation, reaction pathways and mechanism analysis. The accumulation and transformation of heavy metals from the mobile, unstable, acid extractable and reducible fractions to immobilized relatively stable fraction was analyzed by European Communities Bureau of Reference technique. Linear alkanes with methyl substitutions such as pentadecane and hexadecane increased to 70 % at 250 °C with increasing reaction severities due to condensation and polymerization reactions. 95 % of carbons in the final hydrochar fall in the C7-C20 size range. The bioavailability, ecological risk and toxicity of hydrochar decreased significantly due to heavy metal immobilization and reached low potential risk category. Hydrothermal liquor (HTL) was found to contain various valuable chemical species and degradation products including diethyl phthalate and benzene dicarboxylic acid. The results indicate the suitability of HTC for metals immobilization, resource optimization and hydrocarbon recovery.
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