Surfactant leaching (decontamination)

Surfactant leaching is a method of water and soil decontamination,[1][2] e.g., for oil recovery in petroleum industry.[3][2] It involves mixing of contaminated water or soil with surfactants with the subsequent leaching of emulsified contaminants.[1][3] In oil recovery, most common surfactant types are ethoxylated alcohols, ethoxylated nonylphenols, sulphates, sulphonates, and biosurfactants.[3]

References
  1. Environmental Biotechnology: Principles and Applications, p. 272
  2. Knudsen O. Ø., P.J. Brandvik, A. Lewis, "Treating oil spills with W/O emulsion inhibitors: A laboratory study of surfactant leaching from the oil to the water phase", in: Proceedings of the Seventeenth Arctic and Marine Oilspill Program Technical Seminar, 1994, pp. 1023-1034
  3. Hydrocarbon Contaminated Soils, Volume 3, pp. 15,16
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