Waste Upcycling for Marine Rubber Hoses

Abstract

Marine rubber hoses are normally used for loading and offloading condensate or crude oil in oil and gas industries. These hoses are mostly contaminated with hydrocarbons or other heavy metals and disposed of as hazardous waste. With the aim of "zero waste to landfill" and adoption of a waste upcycling approach, better and appropriate disposal methods for used hoses in market were evaluated and selected to support the achievement of the target. Typically, used hoses are disposed of by secured landfill. To avoid the high negative impacts of landfill, used hoses from the Company activities had been accumulated in storage over many years while the Company sought out the best available process to manage them. Burning the waste in a Cement kiln, an alternative waste disposal method, cannot dispose of the hoses completely because they are made with reinforced steel wires; in fact, the hoses must be shredded into smaller pieces prior to burning them in the kiln. As a solution and an endeavor to develop new methods with hose manufacturers, waste disposers and other waste generators, a combination of decontamination and pyrolysis process was selected as the answer. The former is a process of removing contaminants that have accumulated in the hoses and that are critical to health and safety, while the latter is a new way of getting value from burned materials through thermochemical decomposition of organic material at high temperatures while they are in chamber absent of oxygen; this causes the materials to break down into smaller molecules. As a result of this combined process, we are able to convert hoses with reinforced materials into alternative valued products: carbon black, steel wires, and pyrolysis oil, which can be further used as raw material or an energy source for other industries. In terms of commercial use, this new method has resulted in lower cost when compared to using a secured landfill. It serves as an alternative waste disposal method and is considered to be the most efficient process to replace secured landfill. This method may also help the Company in disseminating future best practices on the disposal process to other oil and gas companies who are considering alternative processes and help the Company in promoting the waste upcycling scheme for a better environmental value.