According to information from the Ho Chi Minh City Economic Application Consulting Center, Vietnamese scientists have developed highly effective oil-absorbent materials and devices for separating oil from water using a completely new principle. These products will be showcased at Techmart 2005, which opens on October 15 in Ho Chi Minh City.
Engineer Lê Ngọc Khánh from the Ho Chi Minh City Economic Application Consulting Center is the inventor of the petro-abs oil-absorbent material (each kilogram of this material can absorb between 30 to 60 kilograms of oil, depending on whether it’s floating or viscous oil, and can be reused 400-600 times) and the SOW oil separator. These two products have received patents from the Vietnam Patent Office and the Japan Patent Office. The quick oil-water separator is regarded as the latest device in this field, capable of treating oil-contaminated water to a purity level of less than 1 ppm.
Building on these inventions, the research team, including Dr. Nguyễn Trần Dương, Engineer Lê Ngọc Khánh, Dr. Trần Tri Luân, and Professor Nguyễn Hữu Hiếu, has perfected the production process for the aforementioned materials, oil-absorbent pads, and systems for collecting and separating oil from water.
The research team has established a specialized vessel design center equipped with the above-mentioned material pads and oil separation machines to handle oil spills in nearshore and offshore areas. Currently, the team has produced equipment capable of processing 200 cubic meters of oil-contaminated wastewater per day, with the ability to combine 10 units for a total processing capacity of up to 2,000 cubic meters per day.
For handling oil spills in nearshore areas, the research team utilizes specialized small boats that can approach the shore, equipped with a floating barrier system and on-the-spot oil-water separation machines. The collected oil does not need to be transported ashore but is treated immediately at the site, thus bypassing many costly processes.
For offshore oil spill management, the research team has designed the SOW-Skimmer vessel from composite materials, equipped with a multifunctional system that can simultaneously absorb and separate oil on-site, achieving a capacity of 1,000 cubic meters per day.
The scientists mentioned that another type of SOW machine can nearly completely separate water from oil, which is useful for cleaning oil extracted from drilling rigs.
The price of a large SOW-Skimmer vessel is 3 billion VND, while a small boat costs 300 million VND. The cost of separating oil from water is approximately 2 USD per cubic meter, which is 1/16th the cost of ultra-centrifugal methods, and the size and volume of the SOW separator are only 1/10th that of ultra-centrifugal equipment systems.
