CUC Assistant Executive Director Utu Abe Malae yesterday said the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is funding the purchase of the equipment.
There are two kinds of centrifuges: one will clean the oil used by the power plant engines, while the other will clean the oily water collected outside the plant, he said.
The Tank 104 clean up is funded by the Department of the Interior’s capital improvement program, he added.
“One of the neat things about working at CUC as that everything is interrelated and an idea for one project can be useful in another,” he said.
According to Malae, Tank 104 has a special cleanup problem, which is the emulsion or the layer between the oil and the water in the tank.
“Here is where the centrifuge from the ARRA project can be used to clean up the emulsion and recover any oil to be blended. The resulting sludge can be incinerated,” he said.
Using the centrifuge at the power plant will extend the life of the oil and the engines, he added.
The other centrifuge will be used to clean the oily water collected outside the plant. Once the oil is recovered, it will be blended with the diesel for use as fuel, Malae said.
CUC, however, cannot meet the July 30 deadline imposed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to empty Tank 104, he added.
As of Thursday, he said about 200,000 gallons of oil and about 30,000 gallons of water had been removed from Tank 104.
CUC has contracted Gresco to remove the used oil from the tank.
Malae said CUC is satisfied with how Gresco is doing its job.
