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石油开采废水变宝

The increased use of horizontal drilling and hydraulic¹ fracturing, to extract natural gas and oil in many parts of the United States, has dramatically increased the nation's energy supply, but also raised concerns about such issues as water pollution. Private companies are now rushing into the relatively² new market for recycling drill site water.

美国在很多地方开采天然气与石油时越来越多地采用水平钻井和水力压裂法，美国的能源供应得到极大提高，但是这也引起人们对水污染问题的日益担忧。一个相对来说较新的市场应运而生，吸引了很多私营企业进行开采工地废水回收的工作。

A machine, developed by a company called "OriginOil," removes sludge from water that came from an oil drilling site - with a process originally developed for extracting algae³.

这部由一个叫做“石油起源”的公司研发的机器正在清理石油开采工地的水中带上来的泥。该公司的执行官里戈斯. 埃克尔贝里说，这部机器本来是为了清除水藻而研发的。

“Petroleum⁴ is nothing but old algae, so essentially⁵ what we are doing is taking the organics out and leaving the clean water,” explained company CEO Riggs Eckelberry.

他说： “我们基本上所做的工作是，把石油当成水藻，排除水中的有机物，留下干净的水。”

OriginOil has used its demonstration⁶ equipment in its home state of California to retrieve⁷ petroleum from water a driller had already processed.

“石油起源”曾经在其公司总部所在地加利福尼亚展示过这部机器的功能，从已经处理过的水中收取石油。

“They gave it to us, thinking it was already clean; we brought out that gunky stuff and they saw dollar signs,” added Eckelberry.

埃克尔贝里说：“他们认为，给我们的水已经很干净了，但我们又回收到这粘乎乎的物质，他们看到了挣钱的前景。”

OriginOil's General Manager Bill Charneski says even a small percentage of oil retrieved⁸ from drilling operations can be valuable.

“石油起源”公司总经理比尔.查奈斯基说，从开采地哪怕回收很小比例的石油也会非常有价值。

“If it is produced water and it just has oil in it, then there is going to be substantial value because you can simply put it back in the pipeline⁹ that goes to the refinery,” Charneski said.

“如果开采工地的生产水里有石油，那会很宝贵，因为你可以把回收的石油直接通过管道送进炼油厂。”

Produced water is what comes up with oil and gas from deep earth deposits, but drillers also use tons of water mixed with sand and chemicals in the fracturing process.

石油开采工地的生产水是随着石油和天然气从地下深处的蕴藏层里打上来的，同时，工人在开采过程中也要大量使用混合有沙子与化学物质的水。

Currently, that water has to be trucked in -- and the contaminated water then has to be trucked out -- for disposal at great cost.

现在，开采用水需要用卡车运来，被污染的水再用卡车运走，处理这些水的花费很高。

At Rice University, chemist Andrew Barron, who studies the water issue, says there are now many companies providing on-site processes and using different approaches, depending on local conditions.

莱斯大学的化学专家安德鲁.拜伦研究了处理工地废水问题。他说，现在有很多公司提供开采现场的回收石油业务，并且根据当地条件使用不同的方法。

“I think what you are going to see are industries within regions using specific technologies, " Barron said, "but over all in the country we will see a number of technologies being applied¹⁰.”

拜伦说：“你看到的是各个地区的工业使用特定的技术，不过就全国范围总的来说，我们看到一系列技术得到应用。”

Protests against fracking have grown because of concerns over water pollution.  But Barron is trying to address this issue by developing tracers that can identify water from a given operation.

由于担心水污染，越来越多的人反对使用水力压裂法。不过拜伦正在研发以一定的操作方法可以发现水的追踪剂，以此解决水污染问题。

“The idea is that you would put these tracers in a frack job and if there is contamination in the water from somewhere else, you could potentially trace the source of that contamination,” he explained.

拜伦说：“你在压裂作业时放入这些追踪剂，如果水受到其他什么来源的污染，你就有可能追寻到污染源。”

While that may not answer all environmental complaints about hydraulic fracturing, Barron thinks it will provide better data for everyone concerned.

虽然这无法解决水力压裂法带来的环境问题，但是拜伦认为，他的研发能够为解决人人关注的污染问题提供更详尽的数据。