The Influence of Chemical Dispersants on the Properties of Crude Oil

After oil spills in the coastal aquatic environment, the physical and chemical properties of the spilled oil may change under the influence of the chemical dispersant and form emulsions in the water. This paper presents the results of a laboratory study on the influence of chemical dispersant to the properties of crude oil. The experiments were conducted using two widely-used surfactant GM-2 and BH-X, two crude oil samples and artificial seawater. Density, viscosity and emulsification rate of crude oil with different amounts of dispersant added was measured. The results show that viscosity of the crude oil was highly influenced by the chemical dispersant. The maximum emulsification rate of the Saudi Arabian middle crude oil was 54.1% and 57.4% with the dispersant to oil ratio above 0.8, whereas the emulsification rate of the heavy oil was significantly lower than the middle oil with both of the two types of chemical dispersant.