Production and properties of foamed reservoir sludge inorganic polymers

The feasibility of using reservoir sludge as a raw material in the production of foamed inorganic polymers with different densities is investigated in this work. Reservoir sludge is first crushed, ground down and then calcined at the temperature of 850 °C for 6 h to become calcined reservoir sludge (CRS) powders. A mixture of 30% blast furnace slag and 70% CRS powders is alkali-activated by mixing with different alkaline activating solutions of water, sodium hydroxide and sodium silicate. The viscosities and compressive strengths of the resulting inorganic binders are measured and compared with each other. Furthermore, the inorganic binder paste that has the maximum compressive strength and best workability is mixed with various amounts of preformed air bubbles to produce foamed reservoir sludge inorganic polymer (FRSIP) specimens with different densities. The effects of density on the water absorption, pore size distribution, compressive strength, bending strength and transmission loss of the FRSIP specimens are evaluated.