New process cleanly extracts oil from tar sands and fouled beaches
Friday, March 18, 2011 - 10:30
in Earth & Climate
(PhysOrg.com) -- A new, more environmentally friendly method of separating oil from tar sands has been developed by a team of researchers at Penn State. This method, which utilizes ionic liquids to separate the heavy viscous oil from sand, also is capable of cleaning oil spills from beaches and separating oil from drill cuttings, the solid particles that must be removed from drilling fluids in oil and gas wells.