Estimating adulteration of petroleum-based fuels using neutron reflectometry technique

In majority of African countries, kerosene, a low sulfer petroleum product that burns without much smoke is a primary fuel used in domestic appliances for cooking and illumination. Recently, cases of kerosene explosion have been reported to be on the rise in most parts of Nigeria. The explosions are caused by the presence of significant amounts of low flash-point petroleum products, especially petrol in kerosene (i.e. inter-grade contamination). Apart from transportation in pipes and tankers previously used to convey such low flash point fuels, deliberate mixture of the products by retailers for economic benefits may have occurred. Quality control of petroleum products is an important factor in the balance between considerations such as safety and performance on the one hand and cost and availability on the other hand. The routine methods available for evaluating the properties of fuels with respect to quality are destructive, entail long periods of analysis and are unsuitable for in situ applications. Because of their intrinsic properties neutrons are useful for providing information at microscopic and macroscopic levels in a wide variety of quality control problems, especially with regards to the determination of the total H content of crude oil samples and petroleum products (Akaho et al., 2001, 2002; Al-Jobori et al., 1978; Jonah et al., 1997, 1999). Consequently, in this work, experimental investigation was carried out using a neutron reflection facility at the Centre for Energy Research and Training, Ahmadu Bello University, to develop a routine procedure for estimating the adulteration (i.e. inter-grade contamination) of commercial petroleum-based fuels.