Synthesis zinc oxide nanoparticles for oil upgrading and wax deposition control: effect on calcination temperature

Deposition waxes in the heavy crude oil was a major problem with the enormous impact on production, transportation and economic growth in petroleum industry. Deposition of waxes started to precipitate at lower temperature along the pipeline because wax solubility is decreased. Many tools and chemical was developed to remove wax build up on the internal wall of the pipeline such as pigging. However, there was a potential risk in the usage of pigging due to detailed selection of the correct pig for each pipeline and larger time consuming is required. Therefore, Zinc Oxide (ZnO) nanotechnology was used to study the effect on addition ZnO in the heavy crude oil. In this study, ZnO nanoparticles were synthesized by using Sol-gel method to study the effect on oil upgrading and deposition control by varying the calcination temperature from 300°C to 900°C. Basically the calcined ZnO nanoparticles were characterized using X-ray diffraction (XRD), Field Emission Scanning Electron microscope (FESEM), and Energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) in order to comprehend its structure, size, shape and morphology. XRD results approve the formation of hexagonal wurtzite structure of the ZnO nanoparticles. Decrease in crystallite size from 15.59 nm to 12.84 nm is observed with increasing calcination temperature. However, the crystallite size tends to increase from 12.84 nm to 41.58 nm with increasing calcination temperature. The degree viscosity reduction (DVR %) of heavy crude oil was observed to increase by 41.7% with decreasing ZnO nanoparticles size from 30.11 nm to 12.84 nm. The optimum calcination temperature was observed at 400°C. Wax deposition decrease by 32.40% after addition of ZnO nanoparticles into heavy crude oil.