EP1432649A1

EP1432649A1 - Device and method for the removal of oil or floating materials from a water surface

Info

Publication number: EP1432649A1
Application number: EP02748534A
Authority: EP
Inventors: Richard Egli
Original assignee: Individual
Current assignee: Individual
Priority date: 2001-10-04
Filing date: 2002-08-07
Publication date: 2004-06-30
Also published as: US20050035070A1; WO2003031340A1

Abstract

A device and a method for the removal of floating liquids and solids, in particular oil, from a water surface (30) are disclosed, whereby a pulley roller (2) and a drive roller (3) are driven between two floating bodies (9), in particular of a catamaran (11), preferably by a bucket wheel (4) and thus an endless belt (1) moves around the same. The uptake of oil from the water surface (30) occurs through capillary action into a honeycomb structure in the endless belt (1). Release of the oil preferably occurs by means of blowing out with a compressed air nozzle (5) and trapping in a collecting trough (7). The catamaran (11) is preferably pulled by means of tug with a tow cable and controlled by a control line. The catamaran (11) is supplied with compressed air and the oil is withdrawn preferably by the tug.

Description

Apparatus and method for removing oil or floating matter from a water surface

The invention relates to an apparatus and a method for removing oil, oil-like substances, floating liquids or floating solids from the water surface, in particular on the open sea, preferably with an endless belt which revolves around at least two rollers for receiving and discharging the liquids or solids is arranged.

The great demand for petroleum products as fuels and lubricants as well as raw material for the chemical industry in the industrialized countries leads to a high transport capacity from the oil producing countries to the consumer countries. In the event of accidents or other unforeseen circumstances, oil may escape in larger quantities. In addition, oil or oil-like substances may also leak due to carelessness or inaccurate consideration of, for example, maintenance work on ships in smaller quantities. This results in the release of the oil or oil-like substance on a water surface or on a water surface, if the oil can get to the water, to an oil carpet. The result is a significant threat to water biology and the riparian regions, especially because even small amounts of oil produce a relatively large Olteppich. For this reason, it is important to have effective methods and devices for removing oil spills in order to remove the oil from the water surface after accidents, mistakes or disregard of protection regulations.

In addition to purely chemical processes that result in the precipitation of the oil, processes and devices are also used which have mechanical components. In this case, oil-absorbing materials are applied to the water surface in a complex manner individually in a discontinuous procedure and then removed from the oil, which may then reuse is possible. Furthermore, continuous working methods for removing oil with receiving and donating materials are also known. From DE 3913575 a method for receiving and separating liquids, liquid mixtures or granular solids is known. In this case, a mat of plastic with cell structure, in particular honeycomb structure is applied to the water, wherein the uptake of the oil in the honeycomb cells generally by expansion of the cells and / or contraction of the cell walls occurs. The delivery of the oil from the honeycomb cells is usually by compression of the cells and / or expansion of the cell walls. Essentially the following method is used: a honeycomb mat about three meters wide is drained from a gutter aboard a ship on lines in the water; after the absorption of the oil, wherein the honeycomb mat generally emerges under the oil carpet by the subsequent release of weights, the cumbersome return of the honeycomb mat takes place in the ship. Subsequently, the compression of the honeycomb mat is done for example in a funnel and thus the delivery of the oil on the ship. Such devices can be arranged both in the bow and in the rear area and on the two long sides of an expensive and complicated special vessel.

In addition to this method described above, the honeycomb mat can also be arranged as an endless belt on two guide rollers on the two longitudinal sides of a special vessel, preferably a deflection roller also acts as a drive roller, because it is driven by paddles in the water. The honeycomb mat is thereby moved exclusively in the speed of travel of the ship because an over- or reduction is not provided. This hardly moves to the water surface. The honeycomb mat is compressed in a through-feed funnel, the oil being delivered to an underlying oil sump.

In the application of mechanical methods with the application of individual receiving and donating elements extremely cumbersome and expensive operation is necessary because the individual parts often can be applied and collected manually only, which is associated with high labor costs and heavy physical work. In a non-manual application, although the heavy physical work is generally not in, but are cumbersome expensive and expensive technical equipment necessary, while still a continuous operation is hardly possible.

If the recording takes place in a continuous operation, a complex and expensive special vessel is necessary to which the facilities are attached. This has the consequence that high costs are incurred because the ship with the high maintenance and construction costs can not be used constantly, but only if appropriate impurities occur. Furthermore, the ship must first drive to the site of pollution, which means additional cost and time penalties as well as inland water use in general. When picking up an oil spill this is also divided by the arrangement of the receiving elements on the two sides of a ship disadvantageously, so that the Olteppich is pushed from the ship to the shore and can cause considerable damage.

Accordingly, the invention has for its object to provide an apparatus and a method for removing oil from the water surface, which eliminates the above disadvantages, especially in a simple design allows a division-free recording of oil spill and easy access to waters.

This object is achieved by a device for removing oil, oil-like substances, floating liquids and floating solids from the water surface according to the features of patent claim 1 and a corresponding method according to claim 12. Advantageous embodiments are the subject of the dependent claims.

According to the invention, a revolving endless belt is arranged between two floating bodies, in particular a catamaran, and pulled, pushed or otherwise moved by a ship, the material to be picked up being absorbed by the receiving endless belt in a continuous operation on the water surface. As the endless absorbent belt, a nonwoven belt is preferably used as a combination of cellulose, especially waste paper cellulose, with hemp fiber reinforcement. In this case, the material has a cavity structure, in particular a Kapillarbzw. Honeycomb structure, so that the absorption of liquid substances by capillary forces takes place, wherein the cavity geometry, in particular the honeycomb size, the viscosity of the liquid is adjusted. In addition, already known materials, such as plastics, find application. The advantage of hemp is essentially that it can be easily disposed of after use. Plastics can be washed out and reused after use.

The endless belt preferably has a construction with carrier tapes on the two sides, which have perforations. Between the carrier tapes, the actual fleece with honeycomb structure for receiving the substances is arranged. At the edges of the guide rollers prongs are arranged, which can engage in the perforations and thus allows a positive drive between the drive roller and the nonwoven tape. In this case, the carrier tape has a smaller thickness than the honeycomb structure, wherein the arrangement of the carrier tape on the honeycomb structure is such that one side rests on the guide rollers. The endless belt can adapt to the roundness of the guide rollers due to the flexible connection.

When using a catamaran, the receiving endless belt, in particular nonwoven belt, is mounted on two or more guide rollers between the two floats of the catamaran. The guide rollers are preferably arranged above the water surface, so that the endless belt sags towards the water surface. The drive is preferably carried out with the rear roller, which also acts as a drive roller for the endless belt. The drive takes place in a preferred form via one or two paddle wheels on the outside of the float of the catamaran. In addition to the drive via paddle wheels, other pneumatic, electric or hydraulic drives are possible, these being guided in particular by pulling or pushing ship via supply lines to the catamaran. When using compressed air, for example, on the catamaran only one air turbine with a Be arranged gear, the control of the rotational speed of the endless belt can be done easily with a pressure reducer.

In this case, preferably, the drive roller is driven by a gear transmission from the paddle wheel. It can, for example, entangled chain and belt drives are used, which reverse the drive direction of the drive roller as desired. It can be done by the use of gears with different sizes on the waves of the impeller and the drive roller over- or reduction and thus the speed of the endless belt can be determined. This allows an optimal adaptation to the liquid to be absorbed, for example crude oil, light oil or petrol. The installation of the corresponding gears is normally carried out on land, whereby the nature of the material to be absorbed should already be determined in advance by means of samples.

The storage of the guide rollers takes place in a particularly simple manner on the surface of the two floats of the catamaran. For this purpose, the floating body preferably has a small depression on the upper side into which a bearing for the axis or shaft of the roll can be placed. The camp needs to be fixed from the top only with a Bride. This Bride is z. B. connected on one side by a hinge with the float and on the other side it is screwed with a wing nut. This ensures that when mounting or dismounting the transport roller with the bearing, the Bride only open or swung and the attachment with the wing nut or screwed must be.

Although the endless belt is basically moved in the direction of movement of the float over the two guide rollers, but due to the transmission or reduction with a differential speed to the water surface, whereby the recording of the oil, oil-like substance or floating substance is reliable, since the lower part of the endless belt in can advantageously float on the water surface. The recording can be done in different ways. For example, absorption, adhesion, hygroscopy, chemical bonding and electrostatic charging may be considered. When using an endless belt with a cavity structure, in particular capillary or Honeycomb, this is done via capillary forces. The fleece belt floats on the water and is not pulled under the water as in conventional processes, so that the absorption is better ensured.

The delivery of the absorbed substance is preferably carried out between the two guide rollers at the upper part of the endless belt. In this case, for example, swinging, tapping, rinsing, brushing or pressing come into consideration, wherein preferably the removal with compressed air by blowing out and below the upper part of the endless belt and a Druckluftduse a collecting trough is arranged. The blown oil then splashes or drips into the drip pan, to which preferably a suction hose is connected, with the help of which the separated oil can be sucked into a tow or escort vessel.

The movement of the catamaran is preferably done with a towboat. In this case, two ropes are preferably attached to the two outer sides of the stern of the towboat and to the two outer sides of the bow of the catamaran, the ropes are crossed. For example, to avoid a circular olteppich for recording, seen from the catamaran, the outer rope performs the tensile function. The second rope is used to control the catamaran. The two ropes, which take either tensile or control function, are generally also used to hold the suction hose for the sump and the compressed air hose for the compressed air nozzles and other supply lines, such as electric cables for power and control. It can be arranged as an additional control a rudder on the two easily transportable floats, which are controllable from the towboat. This allows the inclusion of a part of the oil slick in an undivided lane, so that the repeated driving is not required. Preferably, a soiling-inhibiting coating is applied to the floats, in particular with the so-called lotus effect, whereby an accumulation and fixing of the oil spill can be largely prevented.

In addition to this type of connection between tug and catamaran other common connections between two ships are possible, for example on variable or solid rods on any side of the towboat. In addition, in small inland waters, the catamaran can also be moved by ropes and stationary onshore equipment by pulling it back and forth on ropes. In the case of running waters, the catamaran only needs to be fastened to the shore because the relative movement between the watercourse and the catamaran is generally sufficient.

Hereinafter, an embodiment will be explained and described with reference to the drawings. Hereby show:

1 shows a longitudinal section through a catamaran.

Fig. 2 shows a cross section of the storage of Umlenkwalzenachse on

Float of catamaran;

Fig. 3 is a plan view of a tugboat with catamaran;

Fig. 4 is a plan view of an endless belt; and

Fig. 5 shows a cross section through an endless belt.

In Fig. 1 the longitudinal section of a catamaran 11 is shown with one of two floats 9. An endless belt 1 for receiving the oil performs an endless movement about the front guide roller 2 and the rear drive roller 3, which are arranged at the top of the floating body 9. The catamaran 11 is pulled by a tugboat 10 (see Fig. 3), whereby it moves with the direction of travel 25. Due to the movement of the catamaran 11, a paddle wheel 4, which is arranged on each outer side of a floating body 9, driven. The shaft of the paddle wheel 4 drives the drive roller 3 and thus the endless belt 1 with a gearwheel override or counterbore. The endless belt 1 moves on the water surface 30 against the relative movement of the water surface 30 to the catamaran 11 in the direction of movement 26. The endless belt 1 therefore performs a relative movement with respect to the water surface 30 whose velocity is the sum from the amounts of the traveling speed of the catamaran 11 and the moving speed of the endless belt 1 corresponds. By selecting a corresponding transmission or reduction ratio between impeller 4 and drive roller 3 with a gear 27 (see Fig. 3), the relative speed of the endless belt 1 relative to the water surface 30 to the type of liquid to be absorbed, such as crude oil or light oil, can be adjusted , Furthermore, there is also an adaptation of the capillary size of the endless belt 1 to the liquid.

The assembly or assembly of the catamaran 11 takes place on land. Therefore, a sample of the leaked oil must be taken in advance. In this case, the endless belt 1 depends on the deflection roller 2 and the drive roller 3 to the water surface 30, so that the endless belt 1 floats on the water surface 30 while the olteppich 19 can accommodate particularly favorable. The absorption of the oil takes place at the lower band portion 24. The capacity of the endless belt 1 is thus optimized by the swimming on the water surface 30. The floating of the endless belt 1 on the water surface 30 is always guaranteed because small waves from the endless belt 1 itself can be compensated, as indicated by the corrugated representation. Greater waves are reproduced by the catamaran 11 or its floating body 9 itself, in particular by the small and lightweight design.

The discharge of the absorbed oil from the capillaries 21 of the endless belt 1 takes place at the upper belt part 23 by blowing out by means of a transverse Druckluftduse 5. The compressed air, preferably from a compressor, is passed with a compressed air hose 6 from the tugboat 10 to Druckluftduse 5 on the catamaran 11. The blown-out oil is taken up on a drip pan 7 below the upper band part 23 and conducted with a suction hose 8 to the tug boat 10 for storage in an oil tank, as indicated by dashed dotted lines in Fig. 3.

In Fig. 2 is a cross-section of the attachment of the axis 15 of the deflection or drive roller 2, 3 shown on the floating body 9 of the catamaran 11. The float 9 has for this purpose at the top of a trough 13, in which a Bearings 14, in particular a sliding bearing for the axis 15 can be placed. This is connected with a clamp or Bride 17 on one side with a hinge 16 on the float 9. On the other side, the connection is made with a wing nut 18, ie that this connection can be solved quickly and easily by opening and closing. For mounting and dismounting the deflection and drive rollers 2, 3, therefore, only the wing nut 18 must be screwed and the bridge 17 are pivoted or vice versa. This allows an extremely simple installation of the two deflection and drive rollers 2, 3 between the two floats 9 and thus a simple connection of the two floats 9 with each other to the catamaran 11th

In Fig. 3 the top view of the catamaran 11 is shown with the towboat 10. On catamaran 11, the two floating bodies 9 through the front guide roller

2 and the rear drive roller 3 connected together. At the two rollers 2,

3 is the endless belt 1 with the fleece-like, central capillary region 21 (see also Fig. 4) and a carrier tape 20. Holes 22 are provided on the carrier belt 20 into the teeth or serrations (compare Fig. 5) on the rollers 2 , 3 engage and thus enable a positive connection between the endless belt 1 and rollers 2, 3. Slipping is thus excluded. The shaft 15 of the drive roller 3 is driven by gears 27 of the two lateral paddle wheels 4. The removal of the absorbed oil from the endless belt 1 by means of extending over the entire width compressed air nozzle (-n). 5

The catamaran 11 moves in the direction of travel 25. He is doing with the towboat 10 with two lines 28, 29 connected, which are fixed at the respective corners in the rear of the towboat 10 and in the bow area of the catamaran 11 and crossed. The tug line 28 takes over the tensile forces and the control line 29 is used to control the catamaran 11 when driving around (indicated by short wavy lines) oil carpet 19. In addition, even rudder 12 are arranged at the ends of the floating body 9, which can be controlled by the tug boat 10 from , The supply and disposal lines for the catamaran 11, namely the compressed air hose 6, the suction hose 8 and the control lines for the rudder 12 are attached along the lines 28, 29. Therefore only a compressed air compressor, an oil tank with Suction pump and a control unit for the rudder 12 are provided. With the avoidance of the oil slick 19 this can be completely absorbed, without causing a division of the oil slick takes place in an already recorded track and not yet recorded track. Due to the large width of the endless belt 1 recording takes place quickly and economically with a small number of bypasses.

In Fig. 4 is a plan view of the endless belt 1 is shown. It consists of capillaries 21 as a honeycomb structure, which absorb the oil via capillary forces. The size of the capillaries 21 is adapted to the viscosity of the respective oil to be absorbed. At the two edges of the endless belt 1, the carrier tapes 20 are added, the holes 22 have, in the teeth or teeth on the rollers 2, 3 engage to produce a positive entrainment between the rollers 2, 3 and the endless belt 1. As its material, recovered paper cellulose with hemp fiber reinforcement is preferably used. This has the advantage that the endless belt 1 can be easily disposed of after use in an application. In Fig. 5, the corresponding cross section of the endless belt 1 when circulating about one of the rollers, here the drive roller 3 is shown schematically.

Overall, the present invention provides an apparatus and a method for removing oil or other substances from water surfaces, in which large quantities of oil can be taken up inexpensively in a simple manner. In this case, in particular, the mobile application is advantageous, since the catamaran with accessories for the towboat easily assembled and disassembled and thus easily on the land, on water and possibly by air freight is transportable. This allows sites without unnecessary and harmful to nature loss of time can be achieved and all bodies of water, including lakes, are freed from impurities. The cost is much lower, because no elaborate special ship built and constantly ready for use must be kept, but only the float or the mobile catamaran. Whose floats are easy to transport and easy to use, Montagebzw. Disassembly and maintenance, especially in oil / dirt repellent coating with a so-called lotus effect paint.

Claims

1. Device for removing oil, oil-like substances, floating liquids or floating solids from a water surface with an endless belt which is arranged around at least two rollers for receiving and dispensing the liquids or solids, characterized in that the endless belt (1) is arranged between two floating bodies (9).

2. Device according to claim 1, characterized in that the floating bodies (9) are designed as a catamaran (11), the rollers (2, 3) with the endless belt (1) being arranged between the floating bodies (9) of the catamaran (11) are.

3. Device according to claim 1 or 2, characterized in that one of the rollers (2, 3) is designed as a deflection roller (2) and the other roller as a drive roller (3).

4. The device according to claim 3, characterized in that a paddle wheel (4) is provided for driving the drive roller (3), wherein the endless belt (1) in the direction of movement (25) of the float (9) moves to the water surface (30).

5. The device according to claim 4, characterized in that the drive roller (3) from the paddle wheel (4) via a gear, in particular by two gears (27) is driven.

6. The device according to claim 5, characterized in that different transmission ratios for adapting the relative speed between the endless belt (1) and the water surface (30) can be set on the transmission (27).

7. Device according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the shafts (15) of the rollers (2, 3) are arranged on the top of the floating bodies (9), in particular by a trough (13) on the top of the floating bodies (9 ).

8. Device according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that a fleece with a hollow structure, preferably with capillaries (21) or honeycomb structure is provided for receiving the liquid or the solid on the endless belt (1).

9. Device according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that for dispensing the liquid or the solid on the endless belt (1) at least one compressed air nozzle (5) is provided, the compressed air supply preferably from a tugboat (10) with a compressed air hose (6 ) he follows.

10.Device according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that a collecting trough (7) is provided for receiving the dispensed liquid or solid, preferably a suction hose (8) is provided towards a tugboat (10).

11. Device according to one of the preceding claims, characterized in that the floating bodies (9) are movable by a tugboat (10), preferably by pulling on a towing line (28), the control being carried out by a control line (29) is carried out and the two lines (28, 29) are arranged crossing one another at the respective bow or stern area.

12. A method for the continuous removal of substances from a water surface by picking up and separating them with an endless belt, characterized in that the endless belt (1) carried by floating bodies (9) is arranged to float between them on the water surface (30).

13. The method according to claim 12, characterized in that a device is used according to one or more of claims 1 to 11, wherein the floating bodies (9) are preferably provided with an anti-pollution coating.