Enhanced reduction of COD in water associated with natural gas production using iron-based nanoparticles

Moataz Elsaeed Selim; Magdi E Khalifa; Fawaz A Agizah; Eman M Mostafa; Fathi S Awad

doi:10.1039/d4ra00888j

Enhanced reduction of COD in water associated with natural gas production using iron-based nanoparticles

RSC Adv. 2024 Apr 10;14(17):11633-11642. doi: 10.1039/d4ra00888j.

Authors

Moataz Elsaeed Selim¹, Magdi E Khalifa¹, Fawaz A Agizah², Eman M Mostafa³, Fathi S Awad^{1

4}

Affiliations

¹ Chemistry Department, Faculty of Science, Mansoura University Mansoura 35516 Egypt fathyawad949@yahoo.com fathysamy@mans.edu.eg +201000166374.
² Rashid Petroleum Company Cairo Egypt.
³ Production Department, Egyptian Petroleum Research Institute Cairo Egypt.
⁴ Chemistry Department, Faculty of Science, New Mansoura University New Mansoura City 35712 Egypt.

Abstract

The natural gas production industry faces the problem of the proper disposal of produced water and its treatment with significantly advanced technologies to meet the minimum quality standard for irrigation activities, commercial purposes, and consumption by living organisms. This study describes an effective method for reducing the COD (chemical oxygen demand) content in formation water using different metal oxide nanoparticles such as iron oxide (FO), iron zinc oxide (FZO), and iron vanadium oxide (FVO) nanoparticles. These nanoparticles were synthesized and fully characterized using powder X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis, Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopy, field emission scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) analysis, dynamic light scattering particle size (DLS) analysis and zeta potential analysis. The experimental results revealed that the maximum reduction of COD content was 42.18% using FVO nanoparticles with a dose of 3 g L^-1 at 25 °C and pH = 6. Compared to commercial products [Redoxy and Oxy(OXYSORB)], the synthesized FO, FZO, and FVO nanoparticles demonstrated their superiority by achieving excellent results in decreasing the COD content of wastewater associated with natural gas production by more than 86%. This study introduces a promising technique for decreasing the COD content using metal oxide nanoparticles, which are eco-friendly, bio-safe, cheap, and nontoxic materials, and improving the quality of wastewater associated with natural gas production for its safe disposal through sewage and treatment plants.