Abstract
The Canadian oil sands reserves are an important national resource with a large impact on the Canadian economy. Unfortunately, oil sands extraction processes generate toxic by-products called mature fine tailings that need to be stored in disposal ponds for a very long time before the land can be reclaimed. This serious environmental liability needs to be addressed to reduce the environmental footprint of oil sands operations in Canada. In our research group, we have been applying polymer reaction engineering principles to develop new polymer flocculants specifically designed to treat oil sands tailing ponds. This article gives an overview of the research activities in our laboratory in the area of water-soluble polymer flocculants for the efficient dewatering, consolidation and densification of mature fine tailings.
Highlights
After bitumen is extracted from oil sands through the Clark hot water process, the remaining tailings are transported via pipelines to containment ponds
Interactions between dosage and copolymer composition affected all flocculation metrics (ISR, turbidity, capillary suction time (CST) and specific resistance to filtration (SRF)) tested in this investigation. These results suggest that the dominant mechanism when dewatering mature fine tailings (MFT) with poly(acrylamide-co-diallyldimethylammonium chloride) is charge neutralization, an expected result, since the diallyldimethylammonium chloride comonomer is positively charged and should neutralize the negative charges on the clay surfaces
This study demonstrated that the dewatering efficiency of the novel PCLnChMA flocculants, designed for MFT treatment, improved upon in situ hydrolytic degradation
Summary
After bitumen is extracted from oil sands through the Clark hot water process, the remaining tailings are transported via pipelines to containment ponds. Coarse sand particles, fine clay and silt particles, and residual bitumen. The Canadian oil sands industry developed rapidly in recent decades, producing a considerable volume of tailings. MFT has been stored in tailings ponds in northern Alberta. These ponds currently cover about 97 square miles and hold 340 billion gallons of tailings. To put this number in perspective, the volume. Our research group has successfully developed a series of multifunctional copolymers, terpolymers and graft polymers to flocculate oil sands tailings. Besides giving an overview of several polymers developed in our laboratory, we discuss the effect of key flocculation conditions and flocculant properties on MFT dewatering and consolidation behavior
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