Tailings stream treatment processes

摘要

A process for treating a tailings stream comprises (a) contacting (1) a gelling agent and (2) an activator with said tailings stream to produce a gel; (b) entrapping solids including sand and clay, and other solid particles with the gel; and (c) allowing the gel to strengthen and solidify to produce a trafficable deposit; wherein the tailings stream comprises water and solids, which solids comprise sand, clay and other solids particles, and wherein 5% by volume to 100% by volume of the solids have a particle size less than 0.05 mm, based on the total volume of the solids. The process may further comprises spreading the gel produced in step (a) or the trafficable deposit produced in step (c) over a surface. The present invention is particularly useful to treat tailings streams produced in processes to extract bitumen from oil sands ores.

主权项

1. A process for treating a tailings stream comprising (a) contacting (1) a gelling agent and (2) an activator with said tailings stream, wherein the tailings stream comprises water and solids, which solids comprise sand and clay, and wherein 5% by volume to 100% by volume of the solids have a particle size less than 0.05 mm, based on the total volume of the solids; (b) entrapping the solids within a gel; and (c) allowing the gel to strengthen and solidify to produce a trafficable deposit; wherein the gelling agent is selected from the group consisting of colloidal silica, aluminum-modified colloidal silica, de-ionized colloidal silica, polysiloxane, siliconate, and combinations of two or more thereof.