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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 235 records · Page 13
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2025

Renewable diesel and bio-aromatics production from waste cooking oil using ethanol as a hydrogen donor in deoxygenation reaction

Biofuels offer a promising solution in the fight against climate change. With a global increase in waste cooking oil, this research investigated the production of bio-hydrogenated diesel (BHD) from waste cooking oil, using ethanol as a hydrogen donor in the deoxygenation process. A hydrolyzed waste cooking oil model compound served as the feedstock, and the deoxygenation was performed at 300–400 °C. The catalysts used in the experiments were 2.6 wt% Ni and 7.8 wt% Mo (2.6Ni-7.8Mo) and 10 wt% Ni and 5 wt% Mo (10Ni-5Mo) on γ-Al 2 O 3 . The results showed that ethanol is an effective hydrogen donor for biofuel production without the need for external hydrogen at an elevated pressure. The increasing temperature enhanced the free fatty acid (FFA) conversion and n-alkane selectivity in the oil product, with the highest FFA conversion and alkane selectivity of 100 % and 46 %, respectively, observed at 400 °C for the sulfided 10Ni-5Mo catalyst. On the other hand, 2.6Ni-7.8Mo offers 100 % FFA conversion with a lower n-alkane selectivity of 35 % at identical temperatures. The total acid number (TAN) of the oil products decreased from 174.03 mg KOH/g of feedstock to 9.43 and 8.67 mg KOH/g with the sulfided 2.6Ni-7.8Mo and 10Ni-5Mo catalysts, respectively. Both the catalysts achieved similar heating values (~43 MJ/kg) at 400 °C. This is a significant improvement to the HHV of the feedstock, which was 36.02 MJ/kg. Additionally, aromatic compounds, mainly BTXE (benzene, toluene, xylene, and ethylbenzene), were also produced. Compared to glycerol as a hydrogen donor, ethanol more effectively increased n-alkane selectivity due to its higher effective hydrogen-to-carbon ratio (H/C eff ). Conversely, glycerol was more advantageous for achieving greater selectivity towards BTXE compounds due to its lower H/C eff , which potentially leads to coke formation. Since aromatic compounds are intermediates in coke production, glycerol provides higher aromatic selectivity than ethanol. Finally, this study presents an alternative pathway for producing diesel fuel from waste cooking oil using ethanol as a hydrogen donor.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2021

A comprehensive techno-eco-assessment of CO 2 enhanced oil recovery projects using a machine-learning assisted workflow

Carbon dioxide enhanced oil recovery (CO 2 -EOR) projects not only extract residual oil but also sequestrate CO 2 in the depleted reservoirs. Here, this study develops a machine-learning-based workflow to co-optimize the hydrocarbon recovery, CO 2 sequestration volume and project net present value (NPV) simultaneously. Considering the trade-off relationships among the objective functions, support vector regression with Gaussian kernel (Gaussian- SVR) proxies are coupled with multi-objective particle swarm optimization (PSO) protocol and generate Pareto optimal solutions. Taking advantage of the high computational efficacy of the proxy model, economic uncertainties introduced by tax credits, capital costs and oil price are investigated by this study. The results indicate that the tax incentive policy (Section 45Q) plays a vital role in enhancing the economic returns of CO 2 -EOR projects, especially under the depression of crude oil market. The proposed workflow has been successfully implemented to optimize a water alternative CO 2 (CO 2 -WAG) injection project in a depleted oil sand in the US. The optimization results yield an incremental oil production of 15.8 MM STB and 1.37 MM metric tons of CO 2 storage in a 20-year development strategy, with the highest project NPV to be 205.6 MM US dollars.

03 NATURAL GAS↗
DOE OSTI2026

Oil price states and drivers: An analysis of the second-month spot-futures price differential

Oil remains a dominant component of global energy use, and its price, characterized by frequent changes and an ever-present potential for large swings, continues to be a focus of industry participants, policymakers and analysts attention. Here, this study examines the behavior of future spot oil prices using a continuous-time hidden Markov model (HMM) and daily price data spanning years 2007 to 2024. We identify six states in the second-month WTI spot-futures price differential and assess the roles of eleven futures price, quantity, financial market, and geopolitical/volatility variables in each state. The model yields several insights into the workings of the oil market and the relative roles of these drivers. We find support for several theoretical and empirical findings in the oil market literature, including the role of inventory, volatility/risk, and market responses to contango/backwardation in futures markets. A novel finding is that “normal contango” conditions represent a significant portion of next-day states in our in-sample data. Under the most volatile normal contango state, many of the oil market drivers differ markedly in coefficient signs and magnitudes from those in other states. The resulting model also performed well out-of-sample and would, in addition to understanding the impact of market drivers, be useful for short-term forecasting. Overall, the findings highlight the highly non-linear, regime-dependent interactions of the oil price and its drivers, emphasizing the importance of detailed information to market stakeholders.

Oladosu, Gbadebo A. [Oak Ridge National Laboratory↗
DOE OSTI2025

Water structure and electric fields at the interface of oil droplets

Interfacial water exhibits rich and complex behaviour, playing an important part in chemistry, biology, geology and engineering. However, there is still much debate on the fundamental properties of water at hydrophobic interfaces, such as orientational ordering, the concentration of hydronium and hydroxide, improper hydrogen bonds and the presence of large electric fields. This controversy arises from the challenges in measuring interfacial systems, even with the most advanced experimental techniques and theoretical approaches available. Here we report on an in-solution, interface-selective Raman spectroscopy method using multivariate curve resolution to probe hexadecane-in-water emulsions, aided by a monomer-field theoretical model for Raman spectroscopy. Our results indicate that oil-water emulsion interfaces can exhibit reduced tetrahedral order and weaker hydrogen bonding, along with a substantial population of free hydroxyl groups that experience about 95 cm -1 redshift in their stretching mode compared with planar oil-water interfaces. Given the known electrostatic zeta potential characteristic of oil droplets, we propose the existence of a strong electric field (about 50-90 MV cm -1 ) emanating from the oil phase. This field is inferred indirectly but supported by control experiments and theoretical estimates. These observations are either absent or opposite in the molecular hydrophobic interface formed by small solutes or at planar oil-water interfaces. Instead, water structural disorder and enhanced electric fields emerge as unique features of the mesoscale interface in oil-water emulsions, potentially contributing to the accelerated chemical reactivity observed at hydrophobic-water interfaces.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2024

Cycloalkane-rich sustainable aviation fuel production via hydrotreating lignocellulosic biomass-derived catalytic fast pyrolysis oils

Sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) produced from lignocellulosic biomass is emerging as an ideal alternative to conventional jet fuel for aviation sector decarbonization. Catalytic fast pyrolysis (CFP) can convert lignocellulosic biomass into relatively stable bio-oil that can be selectively transformed to various transportation fuels through hydroprocessing under conditions of different severities. In this contribution, two CFP oils produced from pine-based feedstocks over different types of catalysts (i.e., ZSM-5 and Pt/TiO 2 catalysts) were hydrotreated at 125 bar in a non-isothermal process with a maximum temperature of 385 °C over a sulfided NiMo/Al 2 O 3 catalyst to produce SAF with high cycloalkane concentrations of 89–92 wt%. Cycloalkanes are an important component of jet fuel with advantageous fuel properties, such as high energy density, low sooting, and potential for replacing aromatic hydrocarbons to provide good seal swelling properties. The hydrotreating process successfully converted 91–92% of the biogenic carbon in the CFP oil intermediates to liquid-phase hydrotreated products. Through distillation, 39–40 wt% of the hydrotreated oils were collected in the jet-fuel range as SAF fractions. The rest of the hydrotreated product could be valorized as fuels (e.g., diesel) or chemicals. The SAF fractions with oxygen contents below the detection limit (<0.01 wt%) met ASTM D7566 finished fuel blend and D4054 Tier 1 specifications with respect to density, lower heating value (LHV), volatility, flash point, and freeze point. These results indicate hydrotreating lignocellulosic biomass-derived CFP oil as a promising pathway to produce high-quality SAF rich in cycloalkanes. Continued research is required to increase the SAF yield by process improvements, such as increased CFP oil yields, and an enhanced production of SAF-range molecules via e.g., cracking of high-molecular weight compounds either during CFP or hydrotreating, as well as evaluation of a broader range of jet fuel properties and performance requirements.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
DOE OSTI2024

Development of vegetative oil sorghum: From lab‐to‐field

Summary Biomass crops engineered to accumulate energy‐dense triacylglycerols (TAG or ‘vegetable oils’) in their vegetative tissues have emerged as potential feedstocks to meet the growing demand for renewable diesel and sustainable aviation fuel (SAF). Unlike oil palm and oilseed crops, the current commercial sources of TAG, vegetative tissues, such as leaves and stems, only transiently accumulate TAG. In this report, we used grain (Texas430 or TX430) and sugar‐accumulating ‘sweet’ (Ramada) genotypes of sorghum, a high‐yielding, environmentally resilient biomass crop, to accumulate TAG in leaves and stems. We initially tested several gene combinations for a ‘push‐pull‐protect’ strategy. The top TAG‐yielding constructs contained five oil transgenes for a sorghum WRINKLED1 transcription factor (‘push’), a Cuphea viscosissima diacylglycerol acyltransferase (DGAT; ‘pull’), a modified sesame oleosin (‘protect’) and two combinations of specialized Cuphea lysophosphatidic acid acyltransferases and medium‐chain acyl‐acyl carrier protein thioesterases. Though intended to generate oils with medium‐chain fatty acids, engineered lines accumulated oleic acid‐rich oil to amounts of up to 2.5% DW in leaves and 2.0% DW in stems in the greenhouse, 36‐fold and 49‐fold increases relative to wild‐type (WT) plants, respectively. Under field conditions, the top‐performing event accumulated TAG to amount to 5.5% DW in leaves and 3.5% DW in stems, 78‐fold and 58‐fold increases, respectively, relative to WT TX430. Transcriptomic and fluxomic analyses revealed potential bottlenecks for increased TAG accumulation. Overall, our studies highlight the utility of a lab‐to‐field pipeline coupled with systems biology studies to deliver high vegetative oil sorghum for SAF and renewable diesel production.

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2022

Data for Coprocessing Corn Germ Meal for Oil Recovery and Ethanol Production, a Process Model for Lipid-Producing Energy Crops

Efforts to engineer high-productivity crops to accumulate oils in their vegetative tissue present the possibility of expanding biodiesel production. However, processing the new crops for lipid recovery and ethanol production from cell wall saccharides is challenging and expensive. In a previous study using corn germ meal as a model substrate, we reported that liquid hot water (LHW) pretreatment enriched the lipid concentration by 2.2 to 4.2 fold. This study investigated combining oil recovery with ethanol production by extracting oil following LHW and simultaneous saccharification and co-fermentation (SSCF) of the biomass. Corn germ meal was again used to model the oil-bearing energy crops. Pretreated germ meal hydrolysate or solids (160 °C and 180 °C for 10 minutes) were fermented, and lipids were extracted from both the spent fermentation whole broth and fermentation solids, which were recovered by centrifugation and convective drying. Lipid contents in spent fermentation solids increased 3.7 to 5.7 fold compared to the beginning germ meal. The highest lipid yield achieved after fermentation was 36.0 mg lipid g−1 raw biomass; the maximum relative amount of triacylglycerol (TAG) was 50.9% of extracted oil. Although the fermentation step increased the lipid concentration of the recovered solids, it did not improve the lipid yields of pretreated biomass and detrimentally affected oil compositions by increasing the relative concentrations of free fatty acids.

Conversion↗
DOE OSTI2020

2020 Annual Report of Available Drawdowns for Each Oil Storage Cavern in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve

The Department of Energy maintains an up-to-date documentation of the number of available full drawdowns of each of the caverns owned by the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR). This information is important for assessing the SPR's ability to deliver oil to domestic oil companies expeditiously if national or world events dictate a rapid sale and deployment of the oil reserves. Sandia was directed to develop and implement a process to continuously assess and report the evolution of drawdown capacity, the subject of this report. A cavern has an available drawdown if after that drawdown, the long-term stability of the cavern, the cavern field, or the oil quality are not compromised. Thus, determining the number of available drawdowns requires the consideration of several factors regarding cavern and wellbore integrity and stability, including stress states caused by cavern geometry and operations, salt damage caused by dilatant and tensile stresses, the effect of enhanced creep on wellbore integrity, and the sympathetic stress effect of operations on neighboring caverns. A consensus has now been built regarding the assessment of drawdown capabilities and risks for the SPR caverns. The process involves an initial assessment of the pillar-to-diameter (P/D) ratio for each cavern with respect to neighboring caverns. A large pillar thickness between adjacent caverns should be strong enough to withstand the stresses induced by closure of the caverns due to salt creep. The first evaluation of P/D includes a calculation of the evolution of P/D after a number of full cavern drawdowns. The most common storage industry standard is to keep this value greater than 1.0, which should ensure a pillar thick enough to prevent loss of fluids to the surrounding rock mass. However, many of the SPR caverns currently have a P/D less than 1.0 or will likely have a low P/D after one or two full drawdowns. For these caverns, it is important to examine the structural integrity with more detail using geomechanical models. Finite-element geomechanical models have been used to determine the stress states in the pillars following successive drawdowns. By computing the tensile and dilatant stresses in the salt, areas of potential structural instability can be identified that may represent "red flags" for additional drawdowns. These analyses have found that many caverns will maintain structural integrity even when grown via drawdowns to dimensions resulting in a P/D of less than 1.0. The analyses have also confirmed that certain caverns should only be completely drawn down one time. As the SPR caverns are utilized and partial drawdowns are performed to remove oil from the caverns (e.g., for occasional oil sales authorized by the Congress or the President), the changes to the cavern caused by these procedures must be tracked and accounted for so that an ongoing assessment of the cavern's drawdown capacity may be continued. A proposed methodology for assessing and tracking the available drawdowns for each cavern was presented in Sobolik et al. (2018). This report includes an update to the baseline drawdowns for each cavern, and provides an initial assessment of the evolution of drawdown expenditure for several caverns

02 PETROLEUM↗
DOE OSTI2020

Development of Ionic Liquid-Additized, GF-5/6 Compatible Low-Viscosity Oils for Automotive Engine and Rear Axle Lubrication for 4% Improved Fuel Economy

This joint project among ORNL, GM, and DRO successfully developed ionic liquid-additized low viscosity lubricants, SAE 0W-12 and 70W-80, for both IC engine and rear axle lubrication, respectively, and demonstrated combined vehicle fuel economy improvement (FEI). Phosphonium-alkylphosphate ILs have been found to be the most effective among the candidates in protecting surface damage from both sliding wear and rolling contact fatigue, and optimal IL concentrations have been determined. The IL’s impact on three-way catalyst seems to be significantly less adverse than the conventional ZDDP. Oil formulations were optimized for both energy efficiency and wear protection. Tribological bench testing of the IL-additized low-viscosity oils showed at least 40% lower boundary friction, more than 60% lower elastohydrodynamic friction, and greater than 50% less wear compared with commercial baselines. IL-additized lubricants have demonstrated FEI by 9.9% in engine dynamometer tests under extreme conditions and 6.9% increased power output in gear rig tests. Prototype IL-additized engine oil and rear axle fluid exhibited combined FEI of 1.39% and 3.24% benchmarked against the state-of-the-art baselines in vehicle testing of fresh oils under the Federal Test Procedure (FTP) city cycle and Highway Fuel Economy Driving Schedule (HWFET), respectively. Used oil analysis suggested that the IL-additized low-viscosity oils produced less wear than the commercial baselines. The gained fundamental understanding and demonstrated FEI in this work pave the way for future development and implementation of the ionic liquid technology.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2021

Available Drawdowns for Each Oil Storage Cavern in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (2021 Annual Report)

The Department of Energy maintains an up-to-date documentation of the number of available full drawdowns of each of the caverns owned by the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR). This information is important for assessing the SPRs ability to deliver oil to domestic oil companies expeditiously if national or world events dictate a rapid sale and deployment of the oil reserves. Sandia was directed to develop and implement a process to continuously assess and report the evolution of drawdown capacity, the subject of this report. A cavern has an available drawdown if after that drawdown, the long-term stability of the cavern, the cavern field, or the oil quality are not compromised. Thus, determining the number of available drawdowns requires the consideration of several factors regarding cavern and wellbore integrity and stability, including stress states caused by cavern geometry and operations, salt damage caused by dilatant and tensile stresses, the effect of enhanced creep on wellbore integrity, and the sympathetic stress effect of operations on neighboring caverns. A consensus has now been built regarding the assessment of drawdown capabilities and risks for the SPR caverns (Sobolik et al., 2014; Sobolik 2016). The process involves an initial assessment of the pillar - to - diameter (P/D) ratio for each cavern with respect to neighboring caverns. A large pillar thickness between adjacent caverns should be strong enough to withstand the stresses induced by closure of the caverns due to salt creep. The first evaluation of P/D includes a calculation of the evolution of P/D after a number of full cavern drawdowns. The most common storage industry standard is to keep this value greater than 1.0, which should ensure a pillar thick enough to prevent loss of fluids to the surrounding rock mass. However, many of the SPR caverns currently have a P/D less than 1.0 or will likely have a low P/D after one or two full drawdowns. For these caverns, it is important to examine the structural integrity with more detail using geomechanical models. Finite-element geomechanical models have been used to determine the stress states in the pillars following successive drawdowns. By computing the tensile and dilatant stresses in the salt, areas of potential structural instability can be identified that may represent red flags for additional drawdowns. These analyses have found that many caverns will maintain structural integrity even when grown via drawdowns to dimensions resulting in a P/D of less than 1.0. The analyses have also confirmed that certain caverns should only be completely drawn down one time. As the SPR caverns are utilized and partial drawdowns are performed to remove oil from the caverns (e.g., for occasional oil sales , purchases, or exchanges authorized by the Congress or the President), the changes to the cavern caused by these procedures must be tracked and accounted for so that an ongoing assessment of the caverns drawdown capacity may be continued. A proposed methodology for assessing and tracking the available drawdowns for each cavern was presented in Sobolik et al. (2018). This report is the latest in a series of annual reports, and it includes the baseline available drawdowns for each cavern, and the most recent assessment of the evolution of drawdown expenditure for several caverns .

02 PETROLEUM↗
DOE OSTI2022

Available Drawdowns for Each Oil Storage Cavern in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (2022 Annual Report)

The Department of Energy maintains an up-to-date documentation of the number of available full drawdowns of each of the caverns owned by the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR). This information is important for assessing the SPR's ability to deliver oil to domestic oil companies expeditiously if national or world events dictate a rapid sale and deployment of the oil reserves. Sandia was directed to develop and implement a process to continuously assess and report the evolution of drawdown capacity, the subject of this report. A cavern has an available drawdown if after that drawdown, the long-term stability of the cavern, the cavern field, or the oil quality are not compromised. Thus, determining the number of a vailable drawdowns requires the consideration of several factors regarding cavern and wellbore integrity and stability, including stress states caused by cavern geometry and operations, salt damage caused by dilatant and tensile stresses, the effect of enhanced creep on wellbore integrity, and the sympathetic stress effect of operations on neighboring caverns. A consensus has now been built regarding the assessment of drawdown capabilities and risks for the SPR caverns (Sobolik et al., 2014; Sobolik 2016). The process involves an initial assessment of the pillar-to-diameter (P/D) ratio for each cavern with respect to neighboring caverns. A large pillar thickness between adjacent caverns should be strong enough to withstand the stresses induced by closure of the caverns due to salt creep. The first evaluation of P/D includes a calculation of the evolution of P/D after a number of full cavern drawdowns. The most common storage industry standard is to keep this value greater than 1.0, which should ensure a pillar thick enough to prevent loss of fluids to the surrounding rock mass. However, many of the SPR caverns currently have a P/D less than 1.0 or will likely have a low P/D after one or two full drawdowns. For these caverns, it is important to examine the s tructural integrity with more detail using geomechanical models. Finite - element geomechanical models have been used to determine the stress states in the pillars following successive drawdowns. By computing the tensile and dilatant stresses in the salt, areas of potential structural instability can be identified that may represent "red flags" for additional drawdowns. These analyses have found that many caverns will maintain structural integrity even when grown via drawdowns to dimensions resulting in a P/D of less than 1.0. The analyses have also confirmed that certain caverns should only be completely drawn down one time. As the SPR caverns are utilized and partial drawdowns are performed to remove oil from the caverns (e.g., for occasional oil sales , purchases, or exchanges authorized by the Congress or the President), the changes to the cavern caused by these procedures must be tracked and accounted for so that an ongoing assessment of the cavern's drawdown capacity may be continued. A proposed methodology for assessing and tracking the available drawdowns for each cavern was presented in Sobolik et al. (2018). This report is the latest in a series of annual reports, and it includes the baseline available drawdowns for each cavern, and the most recent assessment of the evolution of drawdown expenditure for several caverns.

02 PETROLEUM↗
DOE OSTI2023

A Systems Approach to Increasing Carbon Flux to Seed Oil for Biofuels and Bioproducts Production in Camelina sativa (Final Report)

To combat climate change and alleviate the dependency of the United States on fossil fuels, the transition to biofuel crops has long been proposed as a crucial part of the long-term solution. Camelina sativa has emerged as one of the leading commercially viable options for biofuel and bioproduct production for the U.S. Camelina has the advantages of low agronomic inputs and natural resistance to diverse biotic and abiotic stresses relative to other oilseed crops, and Camelina oil-based blends have been tested and approved as liquid transportation fuels. A major limitation in the widespread adoption of Camelina as a viable industrial oilseed crop is its modest oil yields. This project directly investigated possible paths towards increasing oil, by employing tissue-specific and whole plant systems approaches to identify major regulatory bottlenecks. We developed a new high-throughput method for the identification of multi-gene transformants in polyploid species like Camelina sativa and used this to determine that, contrary to what mathematical models suggested, introduction of the microbial Entner-Doudoroff (ED) pathway into Camelina sativa did not result in significant seed oil increases. We developed flux maps providing accurate and statistically robust models of central carbon metabolism in Camelina, including of cultured Camelina embryos. This knowledge was used in the capacitation of a number of junior researchers in gaining knowledge on approaches used for quantitative flux map analyses. We identified several novel Camelina transcription factor genes regulating fatty acid biosynthesis that showed variable effects on seed oil accumulation in transgenic plants. Among a number of community resources, we also developed a knowledge base web resource (CamRegBase) to integrate Camelina gene regulatory information. Together, research outcomes from this project have contributed to a much better understanding of the regulation and bottlenecks to engineer seed oil production in Camelina.

09 BIOMASS FUELS↗
NASA NTRS1970

Radar monitoring of oil pollution

Radar is currently used for detecting and monitoring oil slicks on the sea surface. The four-frequency radar system is used to acquire synthetic aperature imagery of the sea surface on which the oil slicks appear as a nonreflecting area on the surface surrounded by the usual sea return. The value of this technique was demonstrated, when the four-frequency radar system was used to image the oil spill of tanker which has wrecked. Imagery was acquired on both linear polarization (horizontal, vertical) for frequencies of 428, 1228, and 8910 megahertz. Vertical returns strongly indicated the presence of oil while horizontal returns failed to detect the slicks. Such a result is characteristic of the return from the sea and cannot presently be interpreted as characteristics of oil spills. Because an airborne imaging radar is capable of providing a wide-swath coverage under almost all weather conditions, it offers promise in the development of a pollution-monitoring system that can provide a coastal watch for oil slicks.

Guinard, N. W.↗
NASA NTRS1972

Detection of oil spills using 13.3 GHz radar scatterometer

The results of an analysis of 13.3-GHz single polarized scatterometer data collected during NASA/MSC Mission 135, flown on March 16, 1970 are reported. Data were gathered over a crude oil spill on the Gulf of Mexico off the Mississippi Delta. With the aid of RC-8 camera photographs, the scattering cross section was correlated with the extent of the oil spill. The scattering cross section at higher incidence angles decreased by 5 db to 10 db in the presence of the oil spill. This was attributed to oil's damping of small gravity and capillary waves. The composite scattering theory and the scatterometer acquired data were used to obtain an expression of radar scattering over ocean surfaces with oil spills. The study demonstrates that the presence and extent of oil spills can be detected using high frequency radar systems.

Krishen, K.↗
NASA NTRS1973

Detection of oil spills using a 13.3-GHz radar scatterometer.

This paper describes the results of an analysis of 13.3-GHz single-polarized scatterometer data collected during NASA/MSC mission 135, flown on March 16, 1970. Data were gathered over a crude oil spill on the Gulf of Mexico (test site 128) off the Mississippi delta. With the aid of RC-8 camera photographs the scattering cross section was correlated with the extent of the oil spill. The scattering cross section at higher incidence angles (25 to 50 deg) decreased by 5-10 db in the presence of the oil spill. This was attributed to the damping by oil of small gravity and capillary waves. The composite scattering theory and the scatterometer-acquired data were used to obtain an expression of radar scattering over ocean surfaces with oil spills. The study demonstrates that the presence and extent of oil spills can be detected with high-frequency radar systems.

Krishen, K.↗
NASA NTRS1980

Oil film thickness measurement using airborne laser-induced water Raman backscatter

The use of laser-induced water Raman backscatter for remote thin oil film detection and thickness measurement is reported here for the first time. A 337.1-nm nitrogen laser was used to excite the 3400-cm-1 OH stretch band of natural ocean water beneath the oil slick from an altitude of 150 m. The signal strength of the 381-nm water Raman backscatter was always observed to depress when the oil was encountered and then return to its original undepressed value after complete aircraft traversal of the floating slick. After removal of background and oil fluorescence contributions, the ratio of the depressed-to-undepressed airborne water Raman signal intensities, together with laboratory measured oil extinction coefficients, is used to calculate the oil film thickness.

Hoge, F. E.↗
NASA NTRS1980

Radar detection of surface oil accumulations

The United States Coast Guard is developing AIREYE, an all weather, day/night airborne surveillance system, for installation aboard future medium range surveillance aircraft. As part of this program, a series of controlled tests were conducted off southern California to evaluate the oil slick detection capabilities of two Motorola developed, side looking radars. The systems, a real aperture AN/APS-94D and a synthetic aperture coherent on receive (COR) were flown over the Santa Barbara Channel on May 19, 1976. Targets imaged during the coincident overflights included natural oil seepage, simulated oil spills, oil production platforms, piers, mooring buoys, commercial boats and barges at other targets. Based on an analysis of imagery from the coincident radar runs, COR provides better detection of natural and man made oil slicks, whereas the AN/APS-94D consistently exhibited higher surface target detection results. This and other tests have shown that active microwave systems have considerable potential for aiding in the detection and analysis of surface oil accumulations.

Estes, J. E.↗
NASA NTRS1981

Dynamics of solid dispersions in oil during the lubrication of point contacts. Part 1: Graphite

A Hertzian contact was lubricated with dispersed graphite in mineral oils under boundary lubrication conditions. The contact was optically observed under pure rolling, combined rolling and sliding, and pure sliding conditions. The contact was formed with a steel ball on the flat surface of a glass disk. Photomicrographs are presented which show the distribution of the graphite in and around the contact. Friction and surface damage are also shown for conditions when the base oils are used alone and when graphite is added to the base oils. Under pure rolling and combined rolling and sliding conditions, it is found that, for low speeds, a graphite film can form which will separate the contacting surfaces. Under pure sliding conditions, graphite accumulates at the inlet and sweeps around the contact, but very little of the graphite passes through the contact. The accumulated graphite appears to act as a barrier which reduces the supply of oil available to the contact for boundary lubrication. Friction data show no clear short term beneficial or detrimental effect caused by addition of graphite to the base oil. However, during pure sliding, more abrasion occurs on the polished balls lubricated with the dispersion than on those lubricated with the base oil alone. All observations were for the special case of a highly-polished ball on a glass surface and may not be applicable to other geometries and materials, or to rougher surfaces.

Cusano, C.↗