The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Feb. 20, 1996
Filed:
Oct. 06, 1994
Robert Schutte, Sherwood Park, CA;
Alberta Energy Company, Ltd., Calgary, CA;
Canadian Occidental Petroleum Ltd., Calgary, CA;
Esso Resources Canada Limited, Calgary, CA;
Gulf Canada Resources Limited, Toronto, CA;
Her Majesty the Queen in right of the Province of Alberta, as, , US;
HBOG-Oil Sands Limited Partnership, Calgary, CA;
PanCanadian Petroleum Limited, Calgary, CA;
Petro-Canada Inc., Calgary, CA;
Mocal Energy Limited, Calgary, CA;
Murphy Oil Company Ltd., Calgary, CA;
Abstract
A dispersant, such as sodium silicate, is added to the process water of the hot water extraction process which recovers bitumen from oil sands. The dispersant disperses the ultrafine (less than 300 nm) particles, to reduce the formation of flocs and sludge in the tailings pond. The volume of the pond is such that the retention time of process water is sufficiently short (less than 6 weeks when using sodium silicate) to avoid reforming flocs from the dispersed ultrafines. The ultrafines content in the process water builds up as the water is repeatedly recycled from the pond to the extraction process. The ultrafines content stabilizes at a steady state concentration as some ultrafines are continuously removed from the process water when the tailings are delivered onto the 'beach' of the pond and become trapped in the sand.