The use of low temperature thermal desorption technology in the treatment of drill cuttings

Abstract

One of the management strategies in handling drill cuttings is the use of low temperature thermal desorption technology which goal is to produce oil-free solids for disposal by distilling off the oils from the cuttings and recovering the oil to be reused as drilling fluid. A retort analysis was carried out on the oily and cleaned cuttings to determine the percentage of oil and water content at the temperatures of 350 degrees C and 500 degrees C. The percentages of oil in the oily cuttings are 11.2, 19.4 and 9.6 at 350 degrees C and 13, 14.6 and 23.0 at 500 degrees C and the percentages of oil in the cleaned cuttings were 0.24, 0.21 and 0.23 at 350 degrees C respectively. The concentrations of chlorides and heavy metals are 820 and 0.002mg/l respectively. The result obtained meets the regulatory requirement of oil on cuttings (OOC) of less than 1% by weight, eliminating future environmental liabilities. This study reveals the efficiency of TDU process in the recovery of oil from drill cuttings.