Efficient Removal of Heavy Metals from Crude Oil Using High Surface Area Adsorbent Media: Vanadium as a Case Study

Vanadium, one of the heavy metals present in crude oil, harmfully affects the equipment of oil refineries and the quality of petroleum products. As a result, it is important to innovate effective methods for reducing or removing its concentration. This paper aims to study removing vanadium metal from Iraqi crude oil using activated carbon as an effective adsorbent material. Different experimental factors, i.e., the activated carbon dose, contact time, and agitation speed, were regulatory varied to evaluate their impact on vanadium adsorption efficiency. The outcomes revealed an exceptionally good efficacy of activated carbon to eliminate vanadium. The results exhibited that the maximum remediation was 86.33%, recorded at optimum factors, i.e., 0.5 g of activated carbon, 400 rpm of agitation speed, 75 °C temperature, and time of 400 minutes. According to these findings, activated carbon has a great ability to adsorb vanadium from crude oil. Thus, it can be considered a sustainable material for treating petroleum. Furthermore, this approach will help the refineries by reducing costs by eliminating the heavy metals that lead to corrosion or poisoning catalysts.