Eco-Tec Advanced Produced Water Treatment and Amine Purification

Eco-Tec designs and manufactures a range of advanced filtration (Spectrum Plus™) and ion exchange (Recopur™) systems used for water treatment and amine purification (Amipur™).

Water filtration systems

Eco-Tec’s Spectrum Plus™ granular micro media filters are nutshell filters with a difference. In addition to nutshell media, they incorporate a layer of fine, dense granular media (micro media) designed for filtration of produced water or aquifer, surface or sea water where high filtrate quality is required. This advanced feature provides the filter with the ability to remove solid particles and oil droplets down to one micron in size. Filtration performance approaches the quality of filtrate from membrane filtrations systems but at a fraction of the CAPEX and OPEX systems, and at much greater operability.

Spectrum filters are entirely automated, and use virtually permanent backwashable granular media. They operate at a higher flux rate than more conventional nutshell filters, which makes it possible to treat higher flows with fewer and smaller vessels while achieving excellent filtrate quality.

Spectrum Plus filters have been proven for filtration of produced water from heavy oil production where they have effectively removed particles and droplets to less than two micron. This makes them well-suited for filtration of water to be used for water flooding, ASP or polymer flooding since they act like a nutshell filter and an integral high-efficiency polishing filter.

Ion exchange softeners

Recopur™ ion exchangers incorporate a combination of advanced ion exchange features such as fine resin particles, packed resin beds and short operating cycles. This has allowed them to treat produced water (or aquifer water) that contains high TDS (up to 20,000mg/l) and high hardness (up to 4,000mg/l) to produce very low hardness water, which can be fed into once through steam generators (OTSGs) for production of steam used in thermal production of heavy oil in steam flooding, CSS or SAGD.

The advanced technology of Eco-Tec’s ion exchange softeners is proven with ten systems supplied to heavy oil production areas of California. The most common configuration is an integrated ion exchange softener consisting of strong acid cation (SAC) and weak acid cation (WAC) resin beds, which are both regenerated with salt brine. This eliminates the need for acid and caustic regeneration of WAC resin systems while enabling the user to achieve very low hardness (less than 0.2mg/l).

Amine purification systems

Amipur Plus™ is a compact, skid-mounted ion exchange system designed for continuous removal of heat stable salt (HSS) from amine circuits.

Amine circuits are used for the removal of sulfur (hydrogen sulfide) and carbon dioxide from fuels and gas streams in oil refineries and gas processing plants. The major operational challenges in amine circuits include poor performance due to foaming in absorber towers, equipment corrosion and fouling, and high filter maintenance.

It has become recognised that heat stable salts (HSS), which are a degradation product of the amine chemical and other hydrocarbons, are the root cause of the aforementioned operational problems. Numerous cases have been documented, which indicate that continuous removal of HSS virtually eliminates these operational problems. More than 70 Amipur systems are employed at oil refineries and gas processing plants throughout the world.

About Eco-Tec

Eco-Tec has designed, developed and built industrial water treatment systems and the systems for the purification of chemicals and gas to industries worldwide since 1968. Our products combine high performance, reliability and minimal environmental impact to ensure our clients receive a long-lasting and environmentally sustainable solution to their industry needs.