Development and Performance Evaluation of a Walnut-Shell Filtration System for Treatment and Reuse of Uganda’s Oilfield Produced Water

Uganda’s emerging oil industry will generate considerable volumes of produced water containing dispersed oil, wax, suspended solids and other contaminants. If inadequately treated, this water can damage injection equipment, block reservoir pores and create environmental risks. This pilot project will evaluate walnut-shell filtration as a simple and affordable method for treating produced water from Uganda’s waxy crude-oil operations. Laboratory-prepared or field-collected produced water will be passed through a small filtration column containing cleaned and graded walnut-shell media. Water quality will be measured before and after treatment to determine reductions in oil and grease, turbidity and suspended solids. The study will also examine filtration rate, pressure drop, wax accumulation, media regeneration and performance over repeated operating cycles. Different media sizes, bed depths and flow rates will be compared to identify suitable operating conditions. The project aims to determine whether walnut-shell filtration can provide an effective pretreatment step for reinjection, polymer-flooding operations or subsequent membrane filtration. The results will support the development of a low-cost produced-water treatment system suited to Uganda’s petroleum industry