What challenges do businesses face in the transition to zero carbon?

Transition to zero carbon will be an important business priority over the next years. Governments are activity setting a target to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, which is expected to result in increasing legislation, as well as incentives, to ensure businesses play their part. 

Moving to a position of carbon neutrality is a significant undertaking, with many challenges facing businesses of all types. The desire to reduce carbon emissions is strong and continues to grow, as new generations enter the workforce and demand change. 

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Overcoming cost barriers

With increasing environmental pressures often come associated higher costs. The perceived burden of measuring, classifying and putting a programme of continuous improvement of Green House gas  (GHG) is an additional pressure on a company’s resources.

Change is always approached with apprehension and suspicion. However, with CHANGE comes OPPORTUNITY.

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At SAS ENVIRONMENTAL, we pride ourselves by providing innovative technical solutions to the treatment of wastes and recovery of valuable hydrocarbon resources. Our innovative technology is proven to recover typically 80% of oily volume and returning it to a useable form. This not only reduces residual waste volume and associated treatment and disposal costs; but provides the benefit of the value of the oil recovered.

SAS Environmental customers’ face the same challenges of reducing the discharge of oily waste by converting much of it to reusable resource.  In the months to come the requirement to measure and report material that contributes to the Carbon loading will become an increasing requirement and the incentive to Reduce, Reclaim, Recycle and Reuse will never have been more important.

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We now see that the benefits extend from not only reclaiming valuable resource but the equally valuable reduction in GHG emissions associated with conventional treatment and disposal.

This is no better illustrated by the processing of Oily waste at the INEOS site at Grangemouth.

As legislators embrace the needs for reporting of, and reduction of Carbon rich, oily wastes; increased emphasis will be placed on recovery of these ‘wastes’ and turning them into usable, commercially valuable resource.

Saving the planet, one step at a time.

If you have any waste treatment projects you're working on in oil waste then get in touch with us on any one of the many channels that are available. We would love to talk to you and see if we can help you, help the planet.

Find out more about oil sludge treatment in our Case Study by clicking below.

The chemicals to watch out for in Oil Waste Treatment

Ever feel that the oil waste being delivered to your site is not what you were told to expect? Yes, I thought so. You are not alone in this and that may or may not be a comfort to know. Oil slops and sludge come in a wide range of varieties and even from the same tank, mud pit or waste pit the consistency of the waste will often differ greatly.

We have worked with waste management companies since 2000 and we understand the day-to-day issues in running a process designed to treat one type of waste when in reality a whole range of liquids, watery slops, oily slops, heavy sludge and solids with a wee bit of oil appear. Always with the expectation the material will be treated with the same process.

With our SludgeTreat products our customers can broaden the range of waste types their process can treat. Our SludgeTreat products work on most oil slops and sludge waste and create a great separation between the oil, water and solids. If you use a decanter this is like adding a whole new capability to your equipment. Now the dial will go up to 11.

Simply by adding the SludgeTreat to the oil waste and mixing it this effect will take place. Mixing can be done inline through a static mixer or in a tank with good mixing capability. We can often make a customer’s process work just through circulating the waste with chemical through a pump.

If you have a tricanter for the treatment of oil waste this chemistry will allow the equipment to become substantially more effective. The reduction in viscosity of the sludge through our SludgeTreat products means better separation of the phases.

Use of SludgeTreat products also increases the effectiveness of the process simply by taking highly viscous sludge and reducing the viscosity.

What does this mean for you in reality? It means dry solids coming from your decanter or tricanter. It means high quality oil recovered for re-use or transport and it means water recovered.

More than anything it means you know that the next truck of oil waste arriving or the next tank you open or the next mud pit you take will get done on time. No drama. The SludgeTreat products give you that extra bit of Oomph!

We love solving oil waste issues and we would love to help solve your oil waste issues, challenges and opportunities.  

Discover our SAS SludgeTreat Product Range

Oil and Gas - A view on the industry status

Unprecedented Status

The oil & gas industry is in an interesting phase of its existence. The previous downturn in the oil industry in 2015 seems like yesterday to me! And here we are in a situation few would have predicted. The oil industry remains critical to the global economic engine. Some may not like that fact, but for now it is. When the great global engine slows down the oil industry is badly affected. There are some interesting things going on and each one on its own would merit serious reflection. All of them at the same time, well, that’s really making life interesting. Interesting times means there are opportunities abound.

The drop in oil demand is unprecedented. Some 10-15% reduction is extraordinary. This is causing oil prices to drop, operators to cut back spending and some smaller or older wells will be shut in.

The rise of renewable energy (exponential growth curve, we know all about that kind of growth now) and the constant reduction in costs of renewables puts pressure on oil & gas.

An Environmental Concern

A growing awareness and concern for climate change and the impact this has and will have around the world is starting to sway governments into action and is starting to make an impact on how people are going about their life. Covid-19 might have switched the focus short term, but this is an issue that won’t go away.

There is growing concern around the world on environmental issues. This may be plastics and how they remain in the environment, leaking of methane from oil and gas wells, oil sludge storage and oil spills and drilling waste being left for future generations to handle.

A Focus on Innovation

As an industry the oil industry has a long way still to go. The lock down of much of the industrialised world in the end only reduced oil demand by 10-15%.  The idea that in a short space of time the world won’t need oil and gas is unrealistic. The opportunity for the industry lies no longer in reducing day rates or laying off some more people. The world is changing and the future in the oil industry will belong to those who can bring genuine new technology, proven in the field to market quickly.

The industry has long had a reputation of being slow to take up innovation. That won’t be good enough going forward. There is competition now and a much greater focus from governments, consumers and NGOs. None of that need be an issue. The oil industry is home to amazing technology and capabilities. Becoming more efficient means lower impact on the environment as well. That is a good thing.

Taking Action…

Governments too, have a role to play. There need to be clear signals through regulation, that the environment is not an add on, not a “nice to have”. The oil industry has fuelled an enormous economic growth and most people today are better off because of it. There is however a lot of cleaning up to do. Leaving the remediation of oil industry waste to future generations or governments or the UN is no longer acceptable. The industry needs to step up if it wishes to keep its social license to operate.

Are you interested in discussing the topic forward? Connect with Mark via LinkedIn:

Delivering a tailor-made solution to your waste

All the best plans come to nothing unless you can deliver on the work and meet the expectations and requirements.

As a team we have worked for 20 years to consistently deliver the results when it matters. Genuine delivery of results means you have to always learn, keep an open mind, listen to others with experience and follow a methodical path towards problem solving.

Delivery of results means setting aside egos and working together to implement the hard work carried out in preparation and planning.

We have a deep understanding of the processes involved in oil waste creation, transport and treatment and once on-site we know how to get things set up and continuously improve the process. For example the dose rate of our chemistry virtually always reduces over the first 2 months of operation as we train and guide our clients in use of the chemistry and running the process. Making a waste treatment process as efficient as we can means building long term relationships. It is why we worked with the Ineos refinery in Scotland for over 10 years to treat the stored oil sludge on site.

Our technology has provided us with a unique capability to handle virtually all oil waste. The versatility of our process and chemistry means that with one chemical we can almost always solve any oil waste issue in the treatment process.

We have hugely enjoyed our work over the past 20 years and the amazing experience of seeing people’s daily work life change because what was a problem for them is now just the daily routine of applying our microemulsion chemistry. We have delivered our solutions from the UK to Canada and from Ecuador to Malaysia and Australia. Together we can get this process delivered to your site as well.

Energy world today: Where are we heading?

Last time we discussed the state of the energy industry, its environmental impact and its effects on traditional business models during one of the most challenging times in the 21st century. Today we are going to look closely at how the industry is shifting. The global socio-economic mutations are rapidly adjusting to the COVID-19 context, but not fast enough to get ahead of the curve. In this situation, most energy companies are trying to mitigate the damages. Others are getting ahead of the competition. And some are repositioning in an effort to help now and be relevant in the future.

With the recent apparent breakdown of the OPEC+ agreement Saudi Arabia and Russia have started a mute war on oil price. The first bold move comes with the increase in oil barrel production planned for April. Saudi Aramco will see a 1 million increase to 13 million barrels per day (Mmbpd). This trend is picked up by the neighboring countries with ADNOC increasing its supply to 4 Mmbpd with plans to reach a 5 Mmbpd target.

But this action won’t affect only Russia. The United States were the biggest producers in 2019 with 17.94 Mmbpd and an 18% market share. The US is seeing dissension in its approach of the current pandemic but still responded to the current energy climate. Mike Pompeo, the US secretary of state made a direct appeal to Saudi Arabia to ‘rise up to the occasion’ and cease its current war with Russia. It goes without saying that with the current oil price drop – of 20% globally - the US cannot hold indefinitely against the Middle East. Chevron will reduce its capital expenditure by one-fifth, a staggering sum of $4bn. Philips 66 will cut spending by $700m to $3.1bn across the year. They are joined by international giants like Shell and Total who are also planning to cut spending by $5bn to $15bn and $20bn respectively. This financial restructuring, together with other major trends such as China’s (5% of world oil production market share) faster deceleration in energy demand Iran’s (4% of world oil production market share) socio-economic structure completely overwhelmed by COVID-19 will definitely shake the Top 10 largest rankings of oil producers of 2020.

This glimmer of the current status-quo may provide clean energy companies to provide innovative solutions to the current crisis that could offer the same input without the long-lasting effects of fossil fuels. However, clean energy companies, like everyone else are facing the same economic slowdown. Unlike their counterparts, the clean energy sector does not benefit of a safety net. The draft of the 3rd phase of the US stimulus package contains no energy related funding beyond $3 billion aimed at the strategic petroleum reserve. If we look at the economics of the renewable energy, the oil and gas lower prices will put under pressure the renewable energy sources. This in turn will dramatically affect the supply chain itself. Without a proper policy support. The clean energy sector will be forced to wait for credit markets to recover, allowing cheap hydrocarbons and fossil fuels to negate any developments seen in 2019.

With the worst oil crisis in 100 years, the fact that the oil industry is struggling to cope with the effects of COVID-19 crisis leaves us in an urgent need of innovation. The energy industry will not be the same after this crisis. The Oil and Gas industry was already under pressure before the current crisis and once the world emerges from the Corona virus pandemic the energy industry will need to genuinely innovate and collaborate. Simply cutting oil industry costs & day rates, as after the previous downturn is not going to be sufficient. From here on only companies with a genuinely novel and unique proposition and technology will be able to deliver improved value to the end customer.

There is substantial work to do in the environmental remediation of the legacy created by the oil industry. There is also substantial improvement to be made in environmental practices in the day-to-day work carried out to bring essential oil & gas to the global market.

This is a situation where those who dare will lead the industry.