Desalination of oil field produced water using ion exchange system: As a remediation environmental hazard

Abstract

In this study, a novel integrated ion exchange resin system has been developed to remove salts from hazardous wastewater. Amberlite IR 120 and amberlite IR 400 have been used as the cation exchange and the anion exchange resins respectively which exchange the cations and the anions from the wastewater and consequently make the water free from salts. The adsorption isotherms were studied for both Langmuir and Freundlich models and the adsorption kinetics were established. Amberlite IR 120 and amberlite IR 400 showed excellent adsorption capacities of 161.29 ​mg/g and 233.64 ​mg/g respectively. The regeneration of the resins was also studied and it was found that the resin system could be used multiple times in the desalting process. The resins were further analyzed by FTIR and EDX. The salinity of oil field produced water depends largely on the geochemistry of the producing formations which are harmful or toxic in nature. Thus, this ion exchange resin system can effectively reduce the salinity of the oil field produced water and make it suitable for oil and gas production purposes and various industrial applications.

Keywords

• Oil field produced water
• Salinity
• Ion exchange resins
• Adsorption isotherm