EFFECT OF TEMPERATURE AND SALINITY ON BTEX REMOVAL USING SURFACTANT-MODIFIED ZEOLITE

Lynn E. Katz*
Guifang Tan
University of Texas at Austin
Dept. of Civil Engineering
ECJ 8.6
Austin, TX 78712
Voice: 512-471-4244
Fax: 512-471-5870
E-mail: lynnkatz@mail.utexas.edu

Robert S. Bowman
New Mexico Tech
Socorro, NM

Enid J. Sullivan
Los Alamos National Laboratory
Los Alamos, NM

The United States oil and gas industry generates more than three billion tons of produced water every year. In addition to oil and grease, produced waters contain a number of hazardous aromatic compounds such as benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylenes (BTEX) as well as high salt concentrations varying from 100 ppm to 300,000 ppm. As part of our continuing evaluation of a surfactant-modified zeolite (SMZ) treatment process for produced water, batch and column sorption studies were conducted to evaluate the effects of temperature and salinity on BTEX sorption. Results from these experiments indicated that BTEX sorption increases with increasing temperature and salinity. Partitioning models consistent with these results were used to describe the results and predict performance in laboratory and pilot scale columns.