Advanced Treatment of Flowback Water Using Magnetic Ballast Clarification and Vortex Generating Membrane Systems for Discharge Compensation Committee Report Ben Pakzadeh, Ph.D., P.E. Presented to: Marcellus, Utica, & Point Pleasant Shale Conference Columbus, OH April 16-17, 2014
Authors Southern Research Institute Behrang (Ben) Pakzadeh PhD, PE, Brian Mastin, PhD, Bill Chatterton, Austin Vaillancourt, Jay Renew, PE, Jay Wos M2 Water Treatment Inc. Dave Philbrook, PE BKT Joon H. Min, PhD, Allen Chan, JK Kim, PhD, & HJ Hwang, PhD
Acknowledgement Research Partnership to Secure Energy for America for Project Funding Kent Perry of RPSEA for his support.
Introduction Project partners: Southern Research Institute, BKT United (Anaheim, CA), M2 Water Treatment Inc. (Raleigh, NC) Received an award from Research Partnership to Secure Energy for America (RPSEA) to develop an innovative approach for treatment of shale hydraulic fracturing water to produce National Pollution Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) quality water for discharge and/or reuse.
Flowback Water vs. Produced Water Flowback water 10 to 40% of the water used in fracturing is recovered in about 7-10 days after a hydraulic fracturing job High flow rate Contains clays, chemical additives, low to moderate total dissolved solids (TDS) Produced water Naturally occurring water in shale formation Low flow rate High TDS levels
Flowback and Produced Water Characteristics Free and dispersed oil and grease Oil droplets (sub-micron to 100s of microns); Aliphatic; Aromatic hydrocarbons Suspended solids, sand, turbidity Dissolved oil Soluble aromatic hydrocarbons Organic acid (e.g., BETX, fatty acids, naphthenic, phenols) Dissolved solids (e.g., hardness, metals, NORMs, Na+, Cl-, etc.)
Approach Combines Five Technologies 1. Magnetic ballast clarification (MBC) 2. Vortex-generating Fil-Max membrane system (FMX) 3. Conventional reverse osmosis (RO) 4. Hydrogel adsorbent 5. Solidification/stabilization
Treatment Technologies Identified for this Project 1. Free and dispersed oil and grease Hydrocyclone Oil-Water Separator 2. Suspended solids, sand, turbidity MBC or FMX 3. Dissolved oil FMX-UF 4. Dissolved solids FMX-NF and RO 5. FMX-NF and RO concentrate Hydrogel or Solidification/ Stabilization
Objectives Treat flowback water for reuse or discharge Perform bench-scale studies using small MBC, FMX, and RO units This presentation provides preliminary performance data from MBC and FMX bench-scale studies Flux and flow rates for FMX and RO units Conduct column studies for metals and NORMs removal using membrane concentrates Solidification and stabilization studies Process integration and optimization Field pilot work
Process Integration Oil Separator MBC Clarifier FMX NF membrane To reuse RO membrane To reuse or discharge P-18 Clean Water Membrane Concentrate To reuse Precipitation / Solidification Oil and Organics OR Sludge Handling Hydrogel Adsorption
Magnetic Ballast Clarification (MBC) Clarification using magnetite and polymer Polymer attaches suspended solids to magnetite, forms a dense magnetic floc, and settles rapidly Magnetic floc removed from the water by gravity and magnetically Magnetite is cleaned and recycled in-situ
What is Magnetite? Fully oxidized form of iron (Fe 3 0 4 ) 5 times density of water Magnetic Non-toxic Commonly found in the environment
Magnetic Ballast Clarification (MBC)
Magnetic Ballast Clarification (MBC)
Vortex Generating Membrane (FMX) Patented Fouling Resistance Membrane Filtration System Developed to overcome fouling in conventional membrane filtration technology for high solids, high density, and high viscosity wastewaters. Reduces chemical cleaning (less chemicals) Better matching of membrane types (MF, UF, or NF) to applications. Current applications include anaerobic digester effluent treatment, chemical manufacturing, oil & gas industrial waste.
FMX - Technical Background FMX utilizes a Karman Vortex to achieve fouling resistance. Karman Vortex - strong swirling pattern generating strong turbulence with minimum energy. The rotating blades generate Karman Vortex and turbulent flows. Foulants on the boundary layers are disrupted and carried away by the feed stream.
Vortex Generator System
FMX Custom Systems FMX are installed in parallel to increase throughput and sometimes in series with Reverse Osmosis (RO) systems to improve TDS removal efficiency.
Hydrogel Adsorption for Metals Removal Low cost single use media for selective metals removal Developed at Caltech To be evaluated for high chloride produced water Hydrogel Media (~500 micron size) Pilot tested at EPA and funded by DOE, EPA, NSF
FMX Membrane - Concentrate Treatment FMX Wastewater FMX Permeate Concentrate with metals Hydrogel Vessel
Hydrogel Waste Reduction Waste hydrogel adsorption media volume is reduced by > 90% Simply air drying the spent media to reduce disposal cost (dehydrated media meets TCLP)
Solidification / Stabilization (S/S) S/S includes mixing waste with coal fly ash, gypsum and/or an activation agent (i.e., cement or lime). S/S consists of two processes: 1. Solidification Physically encapsulating the waste to improve physical properties. 2. Stabilization Converting contaminants to less mobile & less toxic forms.
Solidification / Stabilization USEPA regards S/S to be an established treatment process for more than 57 wastes. S/S processes have been effective in the immobilization of NORMcontaminated wastes. Fly ash and gypsum are coal-fired power plant byproducts (waste to resource opportunity)
Flowback Water Samples - Characteristics (Southern Research Institute) Parameter Bakken Produced Water Eagle Ford Flowback Water ph 5.4 7.05 TDS (mg/l) 336889 12892 Chloride (mg/l) 186755 3989 Sulfate (mg/l) <500 <100 Sodium (mg/l) 97182 5960 Calcium (mg/l) 18520 409 Magnesium (mg/l) 1287 72 Potassium (mg/l) 6957 81 Boron (mg/l) 451 44 Silica (mg/l) 118 68 Iron (mg/l) 157 12 Strontium (mg/l) 81 2.6 Barium (mg/l) 29 2.9
MBC Jar Test Performance Data Produced Water from Bakken Shale Treatability tests with polymers/chemicals With polymer only Produced Water from Bakken Shale With magnetite
MBC Jar Test Performance
MBC Jar Test Performance Data Application Parameter Untreated MBC (Treated) % Removal Suspended Solids (mg/l) 314 6 98.0 Produced Water (Bakken Shale) Turbidity (NTU) 417 32.7 92.2 Silica (mg/l) 41.7 6.5 84.4 Total Iron (mg/l) 157 7.2 95.4
FMX-B Membrane Equipment Bench-Scale & Pilot-Scale Bench-Scale Membrane selection Flux and flow rate studies Efficacy evaluations Pilot-Scale
Bakken Shale Produced Water Bench Test Membrane Type Name Flux (LMH) UF Membranes NF Membranes FU-S20-5 116 FU-N10 164 FU-N5 62 FU-SR1-1 66 FN-N10 49 FN-S40 40 FN-D50 No flow FN-D90 20 FN-T10 No flow
Bakken Shale Produced Water Pilot Test Membrane Flux (LMH) Conductivity reduction Turbidity Reduction TS reduction TSS reduction Iron reduction FN-N10 74 58% 98.8% 6.2% >98% 90% Feed Permeate Concentrate
NF Membrane in Produced Water Test Nano-filtration achieves 90% iron removal
Conclusions > 98% TSS removal and > 95% Fe removal Treated water is suitable for reuse in fracking operations (after disinfection) Hardness removal using FMX-NF reduces scaling tendencies NPDES quality water can be achieved for produced and flowback waters with < 60,000 mg/l TDS (in progress) Cost-benefit analysis will be performed to determine CAPEX and OPEX for the treatment process This project will allow for the development of this technology through DOE/RPSEA funds, thereby reducing the financial risk to small producers/vendors.
Advanced Treatment of Flowback Water Using Magnetic Ballast Clarification and Vortex Generating Membrane Systems for Discharge Questions? Ben Pakzadeh, Ph.D., P.E., Southern Research Institute pakzadeh@southernresearch.org Dave Philbrook, PE, M2 Water Treatment Inc. davephilbrook@m2wt.com Joon Min, Ph.D., BKT jhm@bkt21.com