Study of nonionic surfactants on HVOCs removal from coacervate solutions using cocurrent vacuum stripping in a packed column

ABSTRACT

Cloud point extraction has been shown to be an effective technique to remove hydrophobic volatile organic compounds (HVOCs) from aqueous solution using nonionic surfactant. A cocurrent vacuum stripper is used to recover the surfactant in coacervate phase from extraction for economic viability. The solutions containing two series of aromatic and chlorinated HVOCs. Surfactants studied were alkyl phenol ethoxylates, secondary alcohol ethoxylates (AEs), and branched secondary AEs. From equilibrium measurements, the apparent Henry’s law constant (volatility) of the HVOCs in surfactant solution decreased with increasing HVOCs hydrophobicity due to solubilization of the HVOCs in micelles. The results showed that the mass transfer of HVOC decreases due to the solubilization enhancement of the HVOCs.

KEYWORDS:

• HVOCs
• nonionic surfactant
• coacervate
• vacuum stripping
• octanol-water partition coefficient

Acknowledgments

The Discipline of Excellence in Department of Chemical Engineering, Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Prince of Songkla University is acknowledged for providing research support. Center of Excellence on Petrochemicals and Materials Technology Chulalongkorn University under the Ministry of Education (Thailand) is also acknowledged for providing research facilities. In addition, the industrial sponsors of Institute for Applied Surfactant Research, University of Oklahoma, are acknowledged. They are Church & Dwight, Clorox, Colgate-Palmolive Company, Colonial Chemical, Inc., Ecolab, Flotek Chemistry, Huntsman Corporation, Ingevity, Procter & Gamble, Sasol (USA) Corporation, Shell Global Solutions (US) Inc.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Thailand Research Fund (TRF) through a research grant number MRG5480070 to the corresponding author and a TRF Senior Research Gant (RTA5780008) to Prof. Sumaeth Chavadej.