Experimental investigation of the effect of prismatic roughness on the performance of belt skimmers in oil spill recovery applications

Belt skimmers are one of the most widely used techniques in oil-spill recovery for several environmental reasons. This paper aims to illustrate the effect of prismatic artificial surface roughness on the known belt skimmer on its oil recovery rate (ORR). The experimental study was performed involving parameters such as belt inclination angle ranging from 30° to 90°, belt speed ranging from 39 cm/s to 160 cm/s and different oil properties to assess the effect of prismatic roughness on the belt skimmer ORR. The rough belt was found to increase the ORR at low inclination angles. The effect was dominant at highly viscous oils. Enhancement in the ORR due to roughness reached 42% for highly viscous oils at a low inclination angle of 30° and the high belt speed of 108 cm/s. This enhancement decreased gradually with the increase in inclination angle until it reaches an inversion point function of the belt speed beyond which the enhancement effect due to roughness fades gradually. For low viscous oils, the rough belt didn't increase the ORR and had an adverse effect on the belt skimmer performance.