Investigation of oil sourced problems in water treatment by ion exchangers

Abstract

Ion exchange resins may become fouled with oils due to many factors effective during a water treatment process. Oil contamination may occur via leaking seals from pumps or directly from a water source. In the case of oil fouling, formation of an oil film around the resin beads often causes clumping together and, as a result, an abrupt loss in capacity occurs. Laboratory experiments, carried out through this study, have shown that fouling of strongly acidic ion exchangers with oil, even at low concentrations (0.5-2.0 mL) leads to a loss in operating capacity (11%). Fouling of strongly basic ion exchangers shows a very high operating capacity loss (31-32%), but this result was expected, as they are known to be generally less stable than acidic ones.