Embodiments relates to a bitumen recovery process from oil sands. The oil sands may be surface mined and transported to a treatment area or may be treated directly by means of an in situ process of oil sand deposits that are located too deep for strip mining. Specifically, the present invention involves the step of treating oil sands with a composition comprising an alkanolamine and an ethylene oxide capped glycol ether.

The present invention generally relates to methods and process agents for bitumen extraction from ore. More specifically, the method comprises contacting a process agent to the ore and adding water to form a bitumen-containing slurry. The process agent comprises sodium silicate, an aluminate, a dodecyl sulfate, or a combination thereof.

A method is provided for controlling bitumen recovery from an oil sands ore body in a bitumen extraction process by establishing and using a predictive ore processability model that accounts for multiple ore characteristics in planning ore deliveries from different locations of the ore body to produce a blended ore feedstock.

A water-based extraction process for extracting bitumen from mined oil is provided comprising providing a water-based mixture containing bitumen; and introducing nanobubbles to the mixture to attach to bitumen and, thereby, extract the bitumen from the water-based mixture, wherein a nanobubble has a diameter of less than 5,000 nm.

A process for dewatering oil sand fine tailings is provided and comprises a dispersion and floc build-up stage comprising in-line addition of a flocculent solution comprising an effective amount of flocculation reagent into a flow of the oil sand fine tailings; a gel stage wherein flocculated oil sand fine tailings is transported in-line and subjected to shear conditioning; a floc breakdown and water release stage wherein the flocculated oil sand fine tailings releases water and decreases in yield shear stress, while avoiding an oversheared zone; depositing the flocculated oil sand fine tailings onto a deposition area to form a deposit and to enable the release water to flow away from the deposit, preferably done in a pipeline reactor and managing shear according to yield stress and CST information and achieves enhanced dewatering.

A process for improving the dewatering characteristic of tailings is provided comprising adding flue-gas desulfurization (FGD) solids, produced when using calcium oxide to remove sulfur dioxide from flue gas or emissions, to the tailings.

A hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL) system has a biomass slurry flow path with a first pump and a first heat exchanger network downstream of the first pump. The first heat exchanger network includes plurality of heat exchangers in a parallel, series, and/or series-parallel flow arrangement. The biomass slurry flow path extends through cold flow sides of the heat exchangers of the first heat exchanger network. The biomass slurry flow path includes a second pump downstream of the first heat exchanger network, and a second heat exchanger network downstream of the second pump. The biomass slurry flow path extends through cold flow sides of the heat exchangers of the second heat exchanger network. A hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL) reactor is downstream of the second heat exchanger network. Heat transfer liquid in a heat transfer liquid circuit flows through hot flow sides of the heat exchangers of the second heat exchanger network.

Disclosed herein are ether amine additives for use in oil recovery such as steam-assisted gravity drainage and cyclic steam stimulation, as well as surface mining of bitumen. Methods of oil recovery using the ether amine additives are described. The ether amine additives are injected with steam into a subterranean oil reservoir such as oil tar sands to improve recovery of oils such as bitumen and/or heavy oil, or used to wash surface-mined rock to assist in oil extraction therefrom. The ether amine additives may be added to steam in steam-assisted oil recovery methods such as cyclic steam stimulation and steam-assisted gravity drainage. Condensates of the additives in steam exhibit very low advancing and receding contact angles and low interfacial tensions at low concentrations of the additives.

The present invention relates to an improved bitumen recovery process from oil sands. The oil sands may be surface mined and transported to a treatment area or may be treated directly by means of an in situ process of oil sand deposits that are located too deep for strip mining. Specifically, the present invention involves the step of treating oil sands with an ethylene oxide capped glycol ether described by the structure: RO(CH.sub.2CH(CH.sub.3)O).sub.m(C.sub.2H.sub.4O).sub.nH wherein R is a linear, branched, cyclic alkyl, phenyl, or alkyl phenyl group of greater than 5 carbons and m and n are independently 1 to 3.

A portable modular treatment system to be remotely deployed adjacent a solvent extraction bitumen well may include a portable initial separation module configured to receive a liquid emulsion from the solvent extraction bitumen well including bitumen, produced water, solvent, and at least one non-condensable gas, and liberate the at least one non-condensable gas while the solvent remains with the liquid emulsion. The system may further include a portable free water removal module configured to receive the liquid emulsion from the portable initial separation module and separate the bitumen and solvent from the produced water, a portable skimming tank module configured to receive the produced water from the portable free water removal module and remove free oil from the produced water through gravity separation, and a portable condenser module configured to receive the bitumen and solvent from the portable free water removal module and separate the bitumen and solvent.