Evaluation of ultrafine sorbents fabricated via gas assisted melt electrospinning process for oil spill mitigation: Characterization, performance and reusability

Abstract

Mitigation of adverse effects of the oil spills on marine environment, nature, and society calls for introduction and development of various technologies and vast amount of resources. In this study, novel oil sorbents made of a mixture of high melt flow index (MFI) and low MFI polypropylene (PP) polymers filled with graphene nanoplatelets (GnPs) and without GnPs were fabricated via the gas assisted melt electrospinning process, characterized and their performance and characteristics were compared against each other in terms of oil sorption capacity for heavy and light crude oil. The performance tests included sorption performance in oil and oil: synthetic saline water systems and retention behavior for both types of crude oil. To assess reusability and prospects for oil recovery, a straightforward sorption-squeezing process was carried out. Both sorbents, possessed high porosities (for PP/GnPs and PP, 98.7 $\pm$ 0.4 and 95.6$\pm$ 1 %, respectively), fine fiber diameters (for PP/GnPs and PP, 769 ± 44 and 1246 ± 73 nm, respectively) and showed superior oil sorption (110.4 ± 2.5and 80 ± 1.2 g.g⁻¹ for heavy crude oil) and retention performance. Additionally, a noteworthy sorption capacity of 63.1 $\pm$ 3.5and 40.1 $\pm$ 2 g.g⁻¹ was maintained for PP/GnPs and PP after 20 cycles of reuse. This work assessed the effectiveness of gas assisted melt electrospinning (GAME) process and introducing GnPs into the polymer matrix to fabricate highly productive oil sorbents for oil spill mitigation applications as well as their reusability and potential for oil recovery.