| Summary: |
Studies were carried out to evaluate the sorption ca-pacities of expanded and hydrophobizied vermiculite. Sorp-tion capacity is the weight of oil picked up by unit weight of a sorbent. Vermiculite was made hydrophobic by adding carnauba (cerifera) wax. Initial oil pick-up by the sorbents on pure oil and oil on aqueous medium was evaluated. Batch kinetic studies were conducted to evaluate the satura-tion speed of expanded and hydrophobized vermiculite on sorption of oil. Expanded vermiculite showed sorption capacities of 2.53g/g, 2.56g/g and 2.62g/g for synthetic mineral oil (SMO), vegetable oil and Kutwell oil, respec-tively, whereas hydrophobized vermiculite showed 2.46g/g, 2.49g/g and 2.53g/g. In the case of oil on an aqueous medium, hydrophobized vermiculite showed higher sorp-tion capacity than expanded vermiculite. In this case, the sorption capacities of expanded vermiculite were 1.8g/g, 1.91g/g and 2.89g/g for SMO, vegetable oil and Kutwell oil, respectively, whereas those of hydrophobized ver-miculite were 3.45g/g, 3.87g/g and 4.08g/g. It was found that oil can be recovered from vermiculite by applying pressure. These studies also showed that vermiculite can be used as a sorbent for oil removal and hydrophobized vermiculite is a better adsorbent for oil floating on water. |