Understanding Water‐Based Bitumen Extraction from Athabasca Oil Sands

Abstract

The current state of knowledge on the fundamentals of bitumen recovery from Athabasca oil sands using water‐based extraction methods is reviewed. Instead of investigating bitumen extraction as a black box, the bitumen extraction process has been discussed and analyzed as individual steps: Oil sand lump size reduction, bitumen liberation, aeration, flotation and interactions among the different components that make up an oil sand slurry. With the development and adoption of advanced analytical instrumentations, our understanding of bitumen extraction at each individual step has been extended from the macroscopic scale down to the molecular level. How to improve bitumen recovery and bitumen froth quality from poor processing ores is still a future challenge in oil sands processing.

Analytical Electron Microscopy of Carbon-Rich Mineral Aggregates in Solvent-Diluted Bitumen Products from Mined Alberta Oil Sands

“…1,2 Under ambient conditions, bitumen does not flow and has a density similar to water. This presents significant challenges for the extraction of the bitumen, which is usually done through surface mining with water-based flotation of bitumen from the ores, 3,4 or through in situ methods such as the steam-assisted gravity drainage process. 5 As a result of the adverse environmental effects of oil sands tailings ponds, 6 there is recently an increasing interest in nonaqueous extraction (NAE) processes, such as solvent extraction, that do not produce wet tailings.…”

Experimental Studies on the Adsorption/Occlusion Phenomena Inside the Macromolecular Structures of Asphaltenes

“…promote the aggregation of asphaltenes, while the multivalent cation could act as a binder to combine asphaltene molecules to make adsorption easier (Figure 7). 19,20 3.3.3. Distribution of n-C 20 D 42 in the Oxidized Products of Acetone-Extracted Pyrolysates.…”

“…It is proposed that the multivalent cations as a binder promote the aggregation of asphaltenes. 19,20 Detection of n-C 20 D 42 in the oxidation products from both the thermo experiments and the control experiment suggests that occlusion could occur by two ways. One is through chemical processes, e.g., polymerization or condensation of the functional groups in the asphaltene molecules, and then micropores developed, inside which some other molecules are trapped.…”

Probing Mechanical Properties of Water–Crude Oil Interfaces and Colloidal Interactions of Petroleum Emulsions Using Atomic Force Microscopy

“…4 Asphaltenes are defined as a fraction of crude oil which is soluble in toluene and insoluble in n-heptane. 1 Steric stabilization from the interfacial asphaltene layers and non-uniform drainage of the intervening liquid films, as water droplets are pressed together, lead to enhanced emulsion stability. [5][6][7] The strongly elastic interfacial layers act as a mechanical barrier between water droplets and must be deformed beyond the shear yield strength to initiate droplet coalescence.…”