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The problems of land pollution started since the onset of industrialization.

Crude oil contaminated soil and sludge are produced during oil drilling

activities. These include drilling cuttings, drilling mud, sand and tars. The

drilling cuttings are coated with drilling fluids and consist of various rocks,

particulate matter, hydrocarbon, purgeable organics, acid extractables, sand, tars

and heavy metals. Thus the drill cuttings produced by an oil based drilling fluid

are heavily contaminated with the oil and the additives used for preparing the

drilling fluid.

Current cleanup technologies such as vapour extraction, multiphase

extraction, flushing, chemical and thermal treatment are inadequate and

expensive. Also other remediation technologies like bioremediation incineration

and burial of crude oil sludge in landfill causes adverse effect on the

environment. Research has shown that this practice has serious adverse

environmental impacts, some of which are the smothering of seabed life

(Olsgard and Gray, 1995) and the contamination of surface and ground water.
 This research work investigated the possibility of applying

stabilization/solidification technologies to crude oil contaminated soil and

sludge as a means of remediation. Incorporation of the crude ± sludge

contaminated soil in a concrete mixture has both economic and environmental

benefits and could provide a very interesting alternative treatment/fate for these

harzadous solid waste.

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Increased crude oil drilling activities have resulted in the generation of crude

oil contaminated soils and sludges. These are heavily contaminated with

materiasl which are toxic, hazardous, persistent and carcinogenic in nature.

Remediation process like incineration, bioremediation and burial of

contaminated soil in landfills are not only expensive but also causes serious

adverse effect to the environment. These environmental problems range from

contamination of surface and ground water with leachate from the landfill to air

pollution which is caused by incineration of the sludge. Other treatment options

like vapour extraction, multiphase extraction, thermal desorption and physical

separation are expensive and cumbersome. Therefore, there is need to seek for a

cost effective method for the treatment of contaminated soil/sludge.

 The application of stabilization/solidification technologies to crude oil

contaminated soils or sludges would prevent migration and exposure of

contaminated media (soil, sludge) by bonding it with a reagent. Thus, the

physical properties of the contaminated sludge or soil are changed by increasing

the compressive strength, decreasing the permeability and encapsulating the

contaminants to form a solid material. Stabilization and solidification (s/s)

treatment also provides means of reusing/recycling the contaminated soil/sludge

to form new products which can be used for construction works.

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This work was an ex-situ s/s technology for the remediation of contaminated

soil/sludge. The contaminated soil used for the study was collected from DPR

office of NNPC. The scope of work was limited to the following processes.

·p ‘omogenization of the contaminated soil sample by removal of oversize

material using sieves.

·p Characterization of soil sample to check for the physical and chemical

properties such as p‘, sodium absorption ratio, oil and grease, chloride

and moisture content.

 ·p leachate test for leaching of arsenic, barium, cadmium, chromium, lead,

mercury, silver and zinc.

·p ‘ardness test (Unconfined Compressive strength)

·p wet/dry durability test.

Methods in the in the project includes: AP‘A 5520E, AP‘A 408C,

3051(for Atomic Absorption Spectroscopy) and ASTM D-4843. The equipment

used in the project includes: Atomic Absorption Spectrometer, bath,

compression testing machine, containers, digital p‘ meter, mortar, mould, glass

bottle, glass rod, oven/desiccator, rotary agitation device, Sieves,

spectrophometer, and weighing balance. The materials used for the project

includes: Acetic acid, contaminated Soils/Sludges, Lime (CaCO3), portland

cement, and water.

 
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