Paul Painter, professor of polymer science in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Penn State, and his group have spent the past 18 months developing a technique that uses ionic liquids (salt in a liquid state) to facilitate separation.
The separation takes place at room temperature without the generation of waste process water. "Essentially, all of the bitumen is recovered in a very clean form, without any contamination from the ionic liquids," Painter explained. Because the bitumen, solvents and sand/clay mixture separate into three distinct phases, each can be removed separately and the solvent can be reused.
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Environmentally Friendlier Method of Separating Oil from Tar Sands
Re: Environmentally Friendlier Method of Separating Oil from Tar Sands
