Essay About Kim Hosseinpourintroduction        Chemical Oil Dispersants And Chemical Oil Dispersantsgusty Pohlman

Chemical Oil Dispersants Lab
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Experiment 15B—Chemical Oil DispersantsGusty Pohlman, Kim HosseinpourIntroduction        Chemical oil dispersants are solutions used on oil spills to reduce the amount of oil on the surface of the water. Dispersants are made from a mixture of three different types of chemicals: additives, solvents, and surfactants. This mixture works in a way that allows for the dispersal of the oil slick into the water column, reducing the amount of oil washing up onto shorelines. But with this benefit comes a setback. Sparing the coastal habitats puts undersea life at risk, for the chemicals in the dispersant can be toxic, and the decrease of oil on the surface contributes to the increase of oil underwater where there is an abundance of life. The key ingredient in a chemical oil dispersant is the surfactant(s). Surfactants, because they contain both hydrophobic and hydrophilic groups, are able to orient themselves along the oil-water interface. Their presence makes the formation of small droplets of oil more likely. These small drops then are dispersed into the water column, increasing the surface area of the oil. In this experiment we used a dispersant modeled on Corexit, a commercial dispersant produced by Nalco Company. We performed the Swirling Flask Test, a government-validated test, in order to simulate oil dispersion. We measured the amount of oil dispersed into the synthetic seawater and compared it to a sample without dispersant.Materials and MethodsOil Dispersant Experiment MaterialsCrude oil sampleChemical oil dispersantErlenmeyer flask with side arm100-mL volumetric cylinderPipetSample of synthetic seawaterDigital pipettorShaker125-mL separatory funnel and stopperRing stand with iron ring10-mL graduated cylinderSample of dichloromethane25-mL graduated cylinderParafilmSpectrophotometerCuvette Experimental Procedures*See Lab Manual for information regarding the experimental procedure.Results         Raw Data for All GroupsRaw DataCrude Oil 1Crude Oil 2Crude Oil 3ControlA3400.0150.0000.016A3700.0000.8920.000A4000.0020.8010.005Dispersant 1A3400.0070.0290.025A3700.0060.0430.016A4000.0020.0170.024Dispersant 2A3400.0430.0000.044A3700.0510.0140.007A4000.0170.0150.012Dispersant 3A3400.0180.0000.028A3700.0190.0070.035A4000.0330.0000.017Dispersant 4A3400.0110.0000.038A3700.1620.3640.065A4000.0000.0000.021Dispersant 5A340 0.141 A370 0.104 A400 0.113         Calculated Areas of All GroupsAreas (nm)Crude Oil 1Crude Oil 2Crude Oil 3Control0.25538.7750.315Dispersant 10.3151.9801.215Dispersant 22.4300.6451.050Dispersant 31.3350.2101.725Dispersant 45.02510.9202.835Dispersant 5 7.575