Case Study: Drilling Waste Treatment - Pennsylvania

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A waste management company based in Pennsylvania used SAS SludgeTreat 156SC to split and treat heavy emulsified oil slop waste from drilling operations. 

The Problem...

The waste management company was previously using a combination of engineering equipment, dewatering chemistry and heating, which was ineffective at treating the waste to specification. This was due to the complex chemical nature of the slop waste, which was made up of different proportions of oil, water, solids, brines and various other drilling and cleaning chemicals and glycol. 

The waste material ultimately could not be treated and had to be stored onsite taking up valuable tank storage capacity. In addition the waste was sticky and contaminated clarifiers, crystallisation units, filtration equipment, etc.

Any oil that was recovered was actually emulsion waste with 40 - 60% water content. This was well below the requirements of a nearby refinery and any waste oil collection facility.  

The SAS Solution...

The waste management company used SAS SludgeTreat 156SC to treat 60m3 heavily emulsified slop waste using a simple chemical dose, mix and separate process:

  • The slop was dosed with the SAS product at a rate of 0.1% by weight

  • Mixing was carried out through batch processing

  • The treated slop was stored in tanks and a decanter used to separate out the solid and liquid fractions

To Sum Up...

  • Total reduction of waste volume = 60%

  • Increase in volume of oil recovered = 35%

  • Oil quality improvement from 48% water to < 5% water

  • No emulsion waste remaining after treatment

  • Full 3-way split into dry solids, water and oil