Comments on: Squeezing water out of oil

A New Mexico start-up says it has a solution for extracting drinkable water from drilling operations.

[berbar]

Interesting article.

Unfortunately there are still many questions to be answered. Cost is the biggest one.


I assume Altela's device will be installed on a well-per-well basis. I would suppose their device can be manufactured in different sizes, because 4,000 gal/day equals to 95.24 barrels/day, which might be fine for a low rate well. Depending on the area/reservoir, a well can produce much more water than that. I've seen wells producing more than 30,000 barrels of water per day.

It would also be nice to see how much cost it reduces, that is if the have already tested it somewhere.

I would suggest to change the word excavation for drilling.

[REOldtimer]

What about the reverse? You can squeeze millions of gallons of biofuel material from the waste water systems in the US. Today you have commercial ready technologies that can create biofuels from waste water; and by the way, these technologies also reduces the pollution of our rivers, lakes and bays.

[Thomas, David]

If this were truly the case, why can't the create a super efficient means for getting drinking water from the ocean?!?

[DanAtNR]

Dave:

The key here is that the still operates from waste heat from the oil rig. If you were to hook this stuff up to the ocean, the still would need a heat source, and that drags on its efficiency.