PRIORITY CLAIM

This application is a national stage application of PCT/IB2018/057260, filed on Sep. 20, 2018, which claims the benefit of and priority to Italian Patent Application No. 102017000105300, filed on Sep. 20, 2017, the entire contents of which are each incorporated by reference herein.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present disclosure relates to a transportable modular system for emergency treatment of water polluted by liquid hydrocarbon spillage.

BACKGROUND

The serious problem of water pollution in the event of spillage of liquid hydrocarbons (typically, petroleum) is known. Particularly serious situations occur, for example, as a result of accidents at sea involving facilities or vessels for hydrocarbon extraction or transport.

A common intervention strategy in case of liquid hydrocarbon spillage in water, for example from vessels or extraction plants, comprises the containment of the pollutant by floating booms and the subsequent removal and transport thereof to a dedicated processing plant.

Normally, the pollutant is taken together with a significant quantity of water, as no effective separation instruments are available which can be used directly on the site of the spillage.

Consequently, it is necessary to draw, transport and process large volumes of liquid.

Alternatively, in some cases, the oil mass is directly combusted in-situ, with negative implications from the environmental pollution point of view.

Still in the case of operating directly on the spot, treatment with chemical products designed to promote the dispersion of the oily mixture into the environment is known, with many negative aspects affecting the marine ecosystem.

Ultimately, certain known technologies do not allow a fully effective and complete treatment of the pollutant directly on site.

SUMMARY

It is an object of the present disclosure to provide a system for the treatment of water polluted by spillage of liquid hydrocarbons (petroleum and similar oily liquids), which enables certain of the drawbacks of certain of the prior art to be overcome.

Therefore, the present disclosure relates to a transportable modular system for emergency treatment of water polluted by spillage of liquid hydrocarbons (in particular, petroleum and similar oily liquids) including a containerized treatment module comprising an intermodal container which houses a coalescence separator device configured to operate an oil/water separation; a suction pipe having a first end connected to the coalescence separator device and a second end with an inlet connected to a floating skimmer; a volumetric pump positioned along the suction pipe; a water drain pipe connected to a water outlet of the coalescence separator device; and an oil drain pipe connected to an oil outlet of the coalescence separator device.

The present disclosure enables water polluted by spillage of liquid hydrocarbons (hereinafter also simply referred to as oil) to be relatively effectively treated directly on the site of the spillage.

In certain embodiments, the system of the present disclosure is based on the use of transportable modules, such as containerized modules (i.e., made in the form of standard size intermodal containers), which can be transported by road and/or rail to a harbour and then loaded on a vessel to reach the site of the spillage. In this way, a generic vessel, even if not specifically equipped for interventions of water treatment and normally assigned to a different task, can be used if necessary to cope with a spillage of liquid hydrocarbons into the sea, and then go back to its usual tasks when the emergency is over.

The system of the present disclosure, once brought to the site of the spillage, treats the polluted water directly on the spot and in real time.

The polluted water is drawn with a volumetric pump fed by a skimmer, so as to maximize the content of hydrocarbons with respect to water and at the same time minimize the formation of water/oil emulsions.

The polluted water is then treated immediately and continuously by a coalescence separator device (or filter) that separates the water from the hydrocarbons/pollutants, in fluidic continuity with the drawing.

In particular, the coalescence separator device is of the mechanical type operating by contact on coalescence surfaces.

A coalescence separator device of this type (also commonly called coalescing filter) generally comprises coalescence surfaces immersed in a treatment tank and intended for contact with a liquid stream to be treated. The coalescence surfaces are configured so as to be contacted by a liquid flow circulating in the coalescence separator device and to promote the aggregation of droplets of a dispersed phase present in the flow. In other words, the coalescence surfaces are shaped and placed in the device so as to promote the aggregation of droplets of a dispersed phase present in the flow lapping the surfaces.

In general, the coalescence surfaces can take several shapes and arrangements, for example being smooth, undulated or corrugated, provided with channels, etc.

In certain embodiments, the coalescence separator device is a coalescing plate separator device (i.e., the coalescing surfaces are placed on plates that can have various shapes and be organized according to different schemes, with different orientations and arrangements from each other).

It should be appreciated that in addition to the coalescing plate separator devices, other types of devices operating in a similar manner according to the same physical principles can be used, such as for example the so-called “walnut shell” or “sheet” coalescence separator devices.

The pollutants recovered from the separator device are stored on board the vessel and then transported to shore for the final treatment and recovery of hydrocarbons. For example, the pollutants are stored in a tank present on the vessel itself; or, according to a further aspect of the present disclosure, in one or more tanks housed in another module of the system.

The treated water, having a content of pollutants within predetermined concentration limits (for example, limits set by the law), are re-introduced into the environment (the sea) directly on the site, in real time. In this way, separation is carried out on the spot, and as regards transportation to shore, only the volume of the pollutants needs to be accounted for, which is normally equal to approximately a quarter of the total, with relatively significant cost savings.

In order to prevent oil emulsions from forming, with consequent greater collection difficulty, the separator device is not only characterised by the absence of rotating parts (being based on the use of coalescence surfaces), but is also fed by a volumetric pump, avoiding the presence of centrifugal pumps.

The present disclosure therefore achieves the following main advantages:

the possibility of immediate intervention or reduced intervention times;

relative ease of transportation, installation, and disassembly at the end of the operations;

relatively high efficiency water treatment;

relative ease of use;

relatively very low commissioning costs and relatively very low energy consumption;

minimal maintenance both in use and in storage.

Additional features are described in, and will be apparent from the following Detailed Description and the figures.

