Journal of Environmental Analytical Chemistry

Remediation of Oil Polluted Well in Baruwa Area of Lagos State with Potassium Permanganate

Abstract

Temitope OM, Aramide OT, Ajayi OO

Crude oil spills on soil, leakages from pipelines, underground and surface fuel storage tanks and careless disposal and mismanagement of waste and other petroleum by-products of the society, constitute the major sources of petroleum contamination in our environment. The estimated 65,000 people of Baruwa own about 350 hand dug wells for domestic water supply; more than 200 of these wells are at present, under lock and key because of the oil seepage from leaking underground NNPC (Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation) pipeline. Water samples were collected from seven hand dug wells (Jakande, Kamilla, Baale, Shodeinde, Oyewole, Lasunferanmi and Ajayi). Jakande was the control while the rest were the contaminated wells. All the wells contained TPH and Lasunferanmi had the highest TPH while Jakande had the lowest. It was observed that after the application of KMnO4 to the water samples from the oil polluted wells, the TPH concentration reduced significantly in the laboratory. Also, the kinetics of the remediation done for the reactions followed a second order reaction with a proof of linearity of the graphs and R2 value close to unity.