PRP: The Proven Solution for Cleaning Up Oil Spills
Environmental and Agricultural Resources
Originating Technology/NASA Contribution
The Exxon Valdez, an oil tanker exporting millions of
gallons of oil, ran aground just after midnight on March
24, 1989 in Alaska, creating what is, to this day, the
worst environmental disaster in American history. The
affected area of coastal Alaska continues to feel the
toxic results of that disaster that killed more than
250,000 seabirds, thousands of marine mammals, and countless
numbers of other coastal marine organisms in just its
first months. Oil is notoriously difficult to clean from
water, and it is still emerging from subsurface reservoirs.
Salmon caught in that region are, even now, 16 years
later, showing signs of long-term contamination from
the devastating oil spill.
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The
BioSok Bilge Maintenance System is an easy-to-use
“sock” (approximately 3 by 10 inches) that captures
and biodegrades the oil and fuel that leaks into
a boat bilge and can be accidentally pumped overboard. |
While disasters of this magnitude happen rarely, with
large spills making up less than 5 percent of the oil
spilled into water each year, tens of thousands of smaller
oil spills are occurring all around the world. Oil enters
the water supply from road runoff; refuse from routine
engine maintenance; emptying of boat wastewater and other
ship operations; air pollution that settles into bodies
of water after rains; and through offshore oil production,
which can cause ocean oil pollution from spills, leaks,
and routine, operational discharges.
Water can, thankfully, be cleaned or remediated and made
safe again for drinking, swimming, fishing, and boating,
a task made significantly easier if the oil is caught
before it has the chance to settle into the depths. A
product using NASA technology is available to consumers
and industry that enables them to safely and permanently
clean petroleum-based pollutants from the water. It is
almost alchemical in its perfection, as it is comprised
of beeswax microcapsules that act as a food source that
stimulates the indigenous microbes to consume the oil.
The product makes use of NASA microencapsulation technology.
Work was done at the Jet
Propulsion Laboratory (JPL)
to demonstrate the feasibility of encapsulating live
cells, while technology developed at the Marshall
Space Flight Center for experiments in orbital production of
microspheres provides the basic design of the delivery
system.
Partnership
Industry scientists worked with researchers at JPL and
Marshall in the early 1990s to develop the microencapsulated
wonder, PRP, or Petroleum Remediation Product, for the
company Petrol Rem, Inc. In 2004, Universal
Remediation, Inc. (UniRemInc), of Pittsburgh, purchased the assets
of Petrol Rem, Inc., and has rapidly expanded the uses
of the original microencapsulating technology. UniRemInc
has broadened production and availability of PRP, making
it accessible to more clients and in a variety of different
forms.
Product Outcome
The basic technology behind PRP is thousands of microcapsules—tiny
balls of beeswax with hollow centers. Water cannot penetrate
the microcapsule’s cell, but oil is absorbed right into
the beeswax spheres as they float on the water’s surface.
This way, the contaminants—chemical compounds that originally
come from crude oil such as fuels, motor oils, or petroleum
hydrocarbons—are caught before they settle.
PRP works well as a loose powder for cleaning up contaminants
in lakes and other ecologically fragile areas. The powder
can be spread over a contaminated body of water or soil,
and it will absorb contaminants, contain them in isolation,
and dispose of them safely. In water, it is important
that PRP floats and keeps the oil on the surface, because,
even if oil exposure is not immediately lethal, it can
cause long-term harm if allowed to settle. Bottom-dwelling
fish exposed to compounds released after oil spills may
develop liver disease, in addition to reproductive and
growth problems. This use of PRP is especially effective
for environmental cleanup in sensitive areas like coral
reefs and mangroves.
This ecological wonder has also been packaged for specific
uses by UniRemInc to create a variety of different commercial
products, including the BioSok Bilge Maintenance System,
the BioBoom, the WellBoom,
and OilBuster.
One of the most popular uses for PRP is the BioSok Bilge
Maintenance System. It allows boaters to clean up small
spills. Boats take on water, either from rain, washing,
or waves splashing over the sides. This water often mixes
with cleaning fluids, and oil and gas from a boat’s motor.
The water collects in a bilge, the area inside a boat’s
bottom designed to collect and hold the errant water.
A bilge needs to be pumped overboard regularly to prevent
the boat from taking on too much water. This bilge water,
though, is often contaminated.
The BioSok is a small, 3- by 10-inch “sock” with PRP
encased in polypropylene that floats in the bilge, absorbing
and bioremediating any hydrocarbons, thus, decontaminating
the water. Each BioSok can immediately absorb twice its
weight and can degrade more than 20 times its weight
in oil over time. One BioSok will generally last for
an entire boating season. It requires no maintenance
or monitoring, and it safely eliminates the pollutants
and fumes associated with spilled oil and gasoline.
The U.S. Coast Guard is always on the prowl for any boaters
who expel oil-contaminated water from their bilges. Fines
are often thousands of dollars, which makes sense, knowing
that every year bilge cleaning and other ship operations
release millions of gallons of oil into navigable waters
from thousands of discharges of just a few gallons each.
The BioSok is such an effective antidote to polluted
bilge water, that even the Coast Guard has used it on
its boats.
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PRP
Powder is especially well-adapted for moderate-to-small
spills in areas such as industrial plant settings
(cooling ponds and tanks), shorelines (whether
rocky or sandy), marinas, railroad tracks, oil
wells and fields, maintenance facilities, truck
roll-overs, and for marsh and wetlands remediation
where it can mitigate the collateral damage to
the ecosystem caused by cleanup crews. |
UniRemInc also manufactures the BioBoom, essentially
a longer BioSok that can be used to enclose larger oil
spills. It is especially effective for emergency containment
of spilled oil in large areas, like in marinas, ponds,
lakes, or open waters; but can also be effective in tanks,
storm runoff systems, electrical utility vaults, and
anywhere that requires the containment, absorption, and
biodegredation of leaking petroleum hydrocarbons. The
BioBoom acts as a perimeter around spills and prevents
them from spreading. The snake-like tube is 3 inches
in diameter and can be produced at any length up to 10
feet.
The WellBoom facilitates groundwater monitoring by absorbing
floating petroleum more effectively and less expensively
than traditional bailing methods. UniRemInc makes the
standard WellBoom by filling a weighted polypropylene
sock, 36 inches long and up to 3 inches in diameter,
with PRP. The product is then lowered into the groundwater
monitoring wells where it absorbs and accelerates the
biodegradation of any floating petroleum hydrocarbon
contaminants. WellBoom is typically used at petroleum
storage facilities, gasoline stations,
and other locations where there is a potential for groundwater
contamination.
OilBuster is yet another product using PRP that UniRemInc
has developed. It is the beeswax PRP mixed with several
grades of ground corncob and is for use on land or hard
surfaces where no natural microbial population is present.
It is ideal for cleaning oil spills that have not yet
reached the water and that hopefully
never will.
PRP has proven effective in facilities conducting railroad
repair, where ballasts, ties, and the ground can
be saturated with diesel fuel and oil. It is a safe,
cost-
effective way for these types of contaminated facilities
to get quick results that restore the environment and
help them avoid the steep U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency fines.
UniRemInc is continuing to find uses for this amazing
bioremediation technology and to supply consumers and
industry with safe, natural, and effective ways to keep
oil out of our water.
BioSok Bilge Maintenance System™, BioBoom™, WellBoom™,
and OilBuster™ are trademarks of Universal Remediation,
Inc.
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