ENVIRONMENTAL  REMEDIATION  FUELS

Energy reliability, is an essential part of everyday contemporary life. Its generation however, remains a matter of concern, in the aspects surrounding the environmental impact incurred as a result of the processing of our planet's energy resources. Until a sharp transition is made to self-sustaining renewable sources, most industries, especially the solar sector, remain heavily reliant on energy provided by fossil fuel sources, to develop their technologies. 

Furthermore, to accomodate for fuel deficits, we do not necessarily need to augment fuel volumes but rather, enhance fuel performance via an increased energy density.

With the millions of barrels of oil spilled into the environment annually, we suggest a cut back in the drill for fossil fuels and an a focus on the reforming and upgrade of the millions of barrels oil collected from spills as well as recycling of waste oil, so that we have cleaner ecosystem, when fossil fuels are no longer an energy necessity.

Oil is useful for many purposes but when uncontrollably released into the environment, the consequences can be disturbingly disastrous.

Cleanup and recovery from oil spills is a challenging matter, because the process of ecosystem regeneration depends on a multitude of  factors such as:

• The chemical architecture of hydrocarbon oil spilled

• Temperature of the water, which affects the evaporation and biodegradation of the oil

• The environmental nature of the shorelines and beaches the spill spreads on

Oil spills can take extensive periods of time and even years to clean up. Not all components of oils are limited to just being greasy or wax-like in nature. This also includes oils spilled from household energy generating applications, automobiles and commercial platforms. Some elements are highly volatile, carcinogenic, while some contain radioactive elements. It is of crucial importance, that these oil spills are mitigated in an expedited manner, to avoid irreversible damage to ecosystem constituents, whose absence may cause a negative tilt in the balance of marine, avian life quality and coral reefs. It goes without saying, that an imbalance in one ecosystem will always create a cascade of events that  negatively impact the surrounding environment and seep into human life safety via the respiratory distress, the food chain and subsequently the economic health of several nations.

MITIGATION

Planning expedited and efficient spill response ahead of time can significantly minimise the negative consequences of an oil spill on the environment or avoid them all together. 

When oil spills into the environment, its composition is often altered in a manner which makes it more challenging to process into a useable fuel. Essentially, beyond cleaning up a spill, what an environmental company wants to avoid, is the accumulation of waste oil, with no clear perspective on how to recycle or convert it into a useful product.

Given the millions of barrels of oil spilled around the globe, it is hence more reasonable and sustainable, to repurpose spilled oil, as opposed to drilling or fracking for more oil, which only poses further unnecessary risk to the environment and ecosystem damage. In other words, there is much benefit in investing effort in clearing oil spills and managing that waste, as opposed to going after further oil extraction, at the cost of the environment. 

The future of energy generation as we transition from fossil fuels will now entail a clean-up of our affected ecosystems, by using fuels sourced from the superficial environmentally through oil spills and/or recycle waste oil (from e.g. cars, batteries, barges, storage facilities, etc). Using what is already available on the surface of the earth, while simultaneously regenerating and protecting our ecosystems from damage, as we transition to non-fossil fuel power future. 

The spilled oil conversion and or waste oil recycling process is no straightforward task but it is essential, for a sustainable modus operandi, in our future usage of fuel in cars, aircrafts and energy generation and a healing of the fractured areas of our planet.

OUR  REMEDY

NANOARC Carbon offers a range of high performance atomically-architectured quantum materials, functioning as efficient high surface area catalysts at low volumes, for the enhancement of fuel reforming processes. The nanomaterials are geared to facilitate the alteration of waste oil molecular architecture and composition, to  render it more efficient, energy dense for longevity in usage and significantly minimise the levels of CO2 and harmful emissions when combusted.

MAG-R  | BLACK ROSE

NANOARCHITECTURE : Atomically-thin 2D material  |  < 1 nm (< 0.001 μm) thickness

SURFACE AREA (BET)** : 49550 m²/kg

COLOUR : Black/Blackish-Brown Nanopowder

APPLICATIONS : Oil viscousity reduction also for enhanced oil recovery (EOR), accelerate oil removal in water-oil emulsion, Asphaltene scavenging, high capacity oil sorbent, H2O2 decomposition, H2S absorbent, magnetic nanomaterial, dehydrogenation nanocatalyst, ammonia nanocatalyst, decomposition of p-nitrophenol (p-NP).

ASPHALTENE SCAVENGING & OIL SPILL COLLECTION : 1g absorbs up to 10,000 mg of asphaltene in approx 90 mins. The resultant asphaltene-nanocatalyst system further serves as an efficient material conduit for heavy crude  oil spill collection.

OIL-WATER DEMULSIFIER : 

• Approx 99 % oil removal efficiency at nanopowder doses between 10 - 100 mg per litre, depending on oil type and concentration in water. 

• 1g of nanocatalyst powder can absorb  approx 5720 mg of oil depending on the oil type or source (e.g. crude, vegetable oil or diesel, oil recovery from produced water, oil in wastewater), water pH, salinity, temperature and any other contaminant concentrations therein that may interract with the surface kinetics of the nano-catalyst.

IMPLEMENTATION : 

• Spread the nanopowder on the oil surface and mix in the oil-water emulsion. 

• Allow the nanopowder to absorb the oil for about 5 - 10 mins to absorb the oil, then retrieve the nanopowder absorbed with oil using an external magnet. 

• For final phase scrubbing, the nanopowder can also be mixed thoroughly into the water for residual oil absorption and retrieved with an external magnet or separated by gravity

NANOCATALYST REGENERATION : Rinse with ethanol using an ultrasound bath, vacuum dry and re-use for up to 8 cycles till the total organic matter content in water is within environmentally safe limits (remediation).

** A high specific surface area is critical to augmenting the oil sorption capacity and efficiency of a (nano)catalyst. Most systems offered for similar purposes on the market, have an average surface area of 1711 m²/kg . The MAG-R system has a surface area of 49550 m²/kg, which is almost 30x higher than that of conventional catalysts. This enables its usage at lower quantities, for higher sorption capacity and minimises its environmental impact.