title: Influence of softening sequencing on electrocoagulation treatment of produced water.
abstract: Electrocoagulation has been used to remove solids and some metals from both water and wastewater sources for decades. Additionally, chemical softening is commonly employed in water treatment systems to remove hardness. This paper assesses the combination and sequence of softening and EC methods to treat hydraulic fracturing flowback and produced water from shale oil and gas operations. EC is one of the available technologies to treat produced water for reuse in frac fluids, eliminating not only the need to transport more water but also the costs of providing fresh water. In this paper, the influence of chemical softening on EC was studied. In the softening process, pH was raised to 9.5 and 10.2 before and after EC, respectively. Softening, when practiced before EC was more effective for removing turbidity with samples from wells older than one month (99% versus 88%). However, neither method was successful in treating samples collected from early flowback (1-day and 2-day samples), likely due to the high concentration of organic matter. For total organic carbon, hardness, Ba, Sr, and B removal, application of softening before EC appeared to be the most efficient approach, likely due to the formation of solids before the coagulation process.
authors.affiliation: Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, Colorado State University, 1372 Campus Delivery, Fort Collins, CO 80523-1372, United States. Electronic address: nasimrad@lamar.colostate.edu.
authors.forename: Nasim
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Esmaeilirad
authors.affiliation: Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, Colorado State University, 1372 Campus Delivery, Fort Collins, CO 80523-1372, United States.
authors.forename: Ken
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Carlson
authors.affiliation: Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, Colorado State University, 1372 Campus Delivery, Fort Collins, CO 80523-1372, United States.
authors.forename: Pinar
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Omur Ozbek
mesh_terms: D055664:Electrochemical Techniques / Q000379:methods*; D004566:Electrodes; D000067071:Hydraulic Fracking; D006863:Hydrogen-Ion Concentration; D062065:Wastewater / Q000737:chemistry*; D018508:Water Purification / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D062065:Wastewater
keywords: Aluminum; Electrocoagulation; Iron; Produced water; Softening; Water treatment