ENVIRONMENTAL EVALUATION FOR TREATED WASTEWATER IN KHARTOUM REFINERY

Abstract

The environmentally adequate disposal of oily wastewater is a current challenge to the petroleum industry. Currently, more consideration has been focused on the treatment techniques of oily wastewater. Therefore, oily wastewater treatment has become an urgent problem, and it must be explored and resolved by every refinery company. Oil refinery wastewaters contain many different chemicals at different concentrations for example: ammonia, sulfides, phenol and hydrocarbons. The study considered Khar-toum Refinery as study area, treated wastewaters were qualified using standard la-boratory tests for the following properties: Phenol Content, Ammonia Nitrogen, Suspended Solids, Sulfide content, Chemical Oxygen Demand(COD) and Biological Oxygen Demand (BOD) , the average results of oxidation pond (discharge point) samples were compatible withthe Sudanese Standardsand the Chinese standards in: Phenol Content which is reduced to 0.2 mg/l; Ammonia Nitrogen is reduced to 1.7 mg/l .However, the results were in agreement with one of the two standards ,sulfides is reduced to 7.6 mg/l , Suspended Solids value are reduced to 43.3 mg/l,Biological Oxygen Demand is reduced to 33.3 mg/l, Chemical Oxygen Demand is reduced to 142.7 mg/l. The results obviously showed the effectiveness of the treatment methods adopted by the Khartoum Refinery for decreasing levels of the contaminants in dis-charged wastewaters to meet the standards. More research and development workare recommended to adopt new combined treatment processes for Khartoum Refinery wastewater, to maximize the efficiency while decreasing cost of treatment.