| 摘要 |
<p>A mixture containing a dispersed bitumen, oil or hydrocarbon phase and a continuous aqueous phase is passed for treatment through a rotating horizontal tumbler, containing oleophilic free bodies, for the purpose of increasing the particle size of the dispersed phase and facilitating subsequent separation of the phases of the mixture. Alternately, a mixture containing a dispersed aqueous phase and a continuous bitumen, oil or hydrocarbon phase is passed for treatment through a rotating horizontal tumbler, containing hydrophilic and oleophilic free bodies, for the purpose of increasing the particle size of the dispersed phase and facilitating subsequent separation of the phases of the mixture. The free bodies tumbling with the mixture in the drum have affinity for the dispersed phase particles and cause an increase in the particles size of the dispersed phase of the mixture through a process of cyclic coalescence, agglutination, condensation and/or coherence of dispersed phase particles from the mixture onto the surface of the free bodies and cyclic shedding or sloughing off of coalesced dispersed phase back into the mixture. Some mixtures that may be treated include oil sand slurries, effluent streams from a hot sands extraction plant, oil-in-water emulsions from processes that use enhanced oil well recovery, and bitumen froth.</p> |
