Much of the ashes, such as CO2 wastes, are stored in landfills, and much of it has been reused.
Today I met with Mr. Muhannad Hamzeh, a Jordanian engineer in the field of geology who works with Saudi Arabian Corporation for Oil Shale. He explained to me that the environmental problems caused by oil shale extraction can be solved. I learned that a good solution that can minimize the negative environmental impacts of extracting oil from oil shale rocks is “through the use of high technologies”; Hamzeh explained [1].
He also explained to me that “advanced technologies are being used nowadays in the oil shale industries to help finding shale oil reserves far away from populated living and non-living things such as people, animals, and plants, water and fertilized soil.”
On this regard, I have drawn a reasonable conclusion that by allowing shale oil companies that use high technologies we can, then, minimize the impacts of environmental problems caused by oil-shale extraction. That should always be the case for Jordan.
In addition, Mr. Hamzeh stated that “much of the ashes, such as CO2 wastes, are stored in landfills, and much of it has been reused.”
In fact, “oil shale ash is used as building material”. [1]
When I conducted research on this, a source explains how oil shale ash is used in as an additive in concretes and dry mixes. For example, oil shale fly ash has been used in cement factories as raw material, and since 1970 it was widely used in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Belarus and Russia and as a road construction as [2].
Eng. Hamzeh assured to me that oil shale ash “is widely used” in agriculture and has been used for “the soil neutralization as it contains elements such as Ca, K, Mg, S, and P.”
More importantly, Eng. Hamzeh stated that “there are technologies that could be used specifically to reduce the CO2 emissions to only 80%, which could largely reduce air pollution.”
The interview with Eng. Muhannad Hamzeh was so helpful for my ongoing research and in my search for practical and scientific solutions for the environmental problems caused by oil shale extraction. I came up with a solution to reduce the CO2 emissions to only 80%, finding shale rocks in underpopulated areas, and even reusing shale ash in soil neutralization and in building materials.
References
[1] Hamzeh, Muhannad. Personal Interview. July 28th 2018.
[2] Meriste, Tonis. “Estonia’s Experience in Reusing Oil Shale Ash.” http://www.costar-mines.org/oss/30/presentation/Presentation_16-1-Meriste_Tonis.pdf. Enefit. Web. 28 July 2018.
Comentários