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AssigneeTotal SA
InventorsChristophe Halais, Jacques Bousquet, Michel Jean Baptiste; Perrut
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The invention relates to a method for treating oil sand. The steps consisting of cooling said oil sand to a temperature lower than the glass transition temperature of the bitumen by bringing said oil sand into contact with carbon dioxide in the solid state and applying mechanical energy to the mixture produced. Then melting the solid carbon dioxide in such a way as to produce a multiphase system. The multiphase system is then separated into at least one solid phase and at least one liquid phase. The bituminous phase is then recovered from the separated liquid phase. The invention also relates to a device for treating oil sand, especially designed for implementing said method.
A process for treating a bituminous sand comprising a mineral fraction and a bitumen fraction and comprising the following steps:
The process as claimed in one of the preceding claims, wherein the separating fluid is carbon dioxide.
The process as claimed in one of the preceding claims, wherein the separating fluid has a greater affinity for the bitumen than for the sand.
The process as claimed in one of the preceding claims, wherein the step of separating the liquid phase and the solid phase is a gravity separation step carried out in a settler.
The process as claimed in one of the preceding claims, wherein, in the extraction step, the bitumen included in the liquid phase is extracted by evaporation of the separating fluid.
The process as claimed in one of the preceding claims, wherein the supernatant liquid phase obtained at the end of the separation step is heterogeneous and comprises a surface layer containing most of the bitumen and a clear liquid phase containing essentially the separating fluid in the liquid state.
The process as claimed in one of the preceding claims, wherein the contacting step and the separation step are carried out using the same device.
The process as claimed in one of the preceding claims, additionally comprising a step of recovering the separating fluid.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.