Application of waste polypropylene bags as filter media in coalescers for oily water treatment

Abstract

The polypropylene fibers have been used in bed coalescers for separation of micro-sized oil droplets from water for a long time. Possibilities of applying different forms of polypropylene as filter beds are still being in the focus of many researches. The possibility of applying waste polypropylene bags used for packing vegetables (PPDJ) was investigated in this paper. The results are compared with results obtained by applying waste polypropylene fibers from carpet production (PP). It is well known that there are difficulties to separate the oils of low viscosity by polymer fiber beds. Due to the above mentioned, the presented research refers to separation of low viscosity mineral oil from water. The obtained experimental results confirm that the material PPDJ could be efficiently used as a bed material for coalescers. The critical velocity of 50 m h-1 could be reached at using both polypropylene forms that is from bags PPDJ and from the carpet industry PP, when the adequate bulk density of materials is used. [Project of the Serbian Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development, Grant no. 172022]

Keywords

• Oily water
• waste polymers
• fiber bed
• bed coalescer
• bed permeability