Achievement of 100% Removal of Oil from Feathers Employing Magnetic Particle Technology
Publication: Journal of Environmental Engineering
Volume 132, Issue 5
Abstract
Iron powder has previously been demonstrated to be a potential dry cleansing agent for oiled feathers, whereby both the oil ad(b)sorbing particles and the contaminant may be harvested magnetically. Previous studies on feather clusters have only been able to achieve 97.4% removal. While impressive, this is not considered to be entirely satisfactory for wildlife rehabilitation in practice. Reported in this Technical Note is a series of experiments designed to establish whether a grade of iron powder can be identified that is capable of achieving 100% removal and to identify those characteristics responsible for such improvement. To this end, the abilities of nine different grades of iron powder to remove four different contaminants (three crude oils and a crude oil/seawater emulsion) from feather clusters have been compared, as have the relative physical characteristics of the different iron powders. It has been established that the efficiency of remediation is indeed related to certain physical attributes of the particles (the “grade”). Specifically, a spongy superfine iron powder has been identified that is capable of achieving 100% removal (within experimental error) for all four contaminants tested. This represents an important proof of principle that makes the development of a practical field device a real possibility.
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Acknowledgments
The writers would like to express their gratitude to Mr. Canto Leyton Ricardo and Mr. Luckmeier Thomas of Höganäs AB, Sweden, and Mr. Stephen Weir of Höganäs, Australia, for the generous provision of a wide range of iron powders. Thanks are also extended to Mr. Graham Vimpani of Exxon/Mobil Oil Pty. Ltd., Australia, for the supply of oil samples.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Environmental Engineering
Volume 132 • Issue 5 • May 2006
Pages: 555 - 559
Copyright
© 2006 ASCE.
History
Received: May 20, 2004
Accepted: Sep 14, 2005
Published online: May 1, 2006
Published in print: May 2006
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