For the First Time, a Laser was Used to Burn out Oil Spills on Water
The Rosatom installation allows eliminating oil pollution at low temperatures.
Rosatom specialists tested a mobile laser complex for removing oil spills on the surface of water. The experiment was carried out in the Sea of Okhotsk off the coast of Sakhalin. Laser technology developed by TRINITY Institute specialists was used for the first time to burn out an oil slick. The Devon News Agency learned about this from a message from the press service of the Rosatom State Corporation.
For this purpose, special equipment was used to block the entry of flammable substances into the water. At the same time, all necessary safety measures were observed, the company notes. The laser was placed on the deck of a cargo ship. To simulate an oil spill, a raft consisting of a wooden frame and foam sheets was used.
The top of the raft was covered with sheets of roofing material. They were coated with a special high-viscosity mixture of crude oil and bitumen to prevent them from ending up in the sea. The institute’s specialists used laser radiation to ignite the flammable mixture on the raft from a distance of about 300 meters. The mobile laser complex allows for contactless cleaning. In this case, no preparatory work is required.
“The use of lasers to remove oil films on the surface of water can become a promising method for eliminating emergency spills in the Arctic,” commented Kirill Ilyin, General Director of the State Research Center of the Russian Federation TRINITY. – There, due to low temperatures, it is impossible to use biological methods, and ice interferes with the work of oil skimmers. A domestic laser will allow cleaning work to be carried out safely and quickly.”
After completing the tests, the institute’s specialists plan to create a prototype of a laser complex for rapid response to emergency oil spills. It will be placed on the deck of a ship operating on the Northern Sea Route (NSR).
The customer for the creation of the complex was the Private Institution for the Scientific Development of the Nuclear Industry “Science and Innovation”.
Trinity Institute of Innovative and Thermonuclear Research (TRINITI) is part of the Rosatom State Corporation. The Moscow Institute is engaged in research into plasma, controlled thermonuclear fusion, laser physics and technology, physics of extreme states of matter and energy conversion processes. The institution is also developing models to predict the behavior of nuclear reactor fuel.
