Hi,
Your site is very interesting. I have been working with both humic and fulvic acid and I was wondering if it is possible to convert humic acid into petroleum? Since it is a precursor to petroleum and crude oil, then would a simple decarboxylation reaction form petroleum by-products in the humic acid?
How would this be accomplished? Is this a chemical reaction or can it be done using microbials?
Your site is very interesting. I separating humic acid from soils to study interaction of pesticides with humic acid in order to understand the retention of pesticides on soil and thereafter their degaradation behaviour. Is it neccessary to pass the extracted humic acid through DOWEX resin for its purification? If it is what is its eluant? I lack exact methodology for purification.
Since you are want to determine the degradation of pesticides with humic acids in soil, I suggest that you do not purify the humic acid. The reason for this is that you may obtain results for pure humic acid that are not relevant to soil situations, i.e. it may be too pure. In soils humic acid is complexed to many substances (including clay and metal ions) and this “mixture” determines its properties, which will be different to pure humic acid. However, if you wish to obtain very pure humic acid, this is the procedure that I have used:
1. Extract soil with 0.1 M sodium hydroxide and separate the liquid
2. Filter through a 0.4 micron filter to remove particles that will recombine with humic acids in the next step
3. Adjust pH to ~1 with hydrochloric acid
4. Extract with n-butanol
5. Evaporate n-butanol under vacuum with heating
I have never used the Dowex method for humic acids, but I have used the XAD-7 method for fulvic acids which requires ethanol or ethanol/ ammonia for elution.
We have started the fabrication of a Sodium/Potaasium Humate planr and after fabricating close to 80 % we realised that the leonardite deposits in our region have been depleted due to extensive purchase by other factories..now only low grade leonadite with about 30 % humic acidn is available as opposed to 65% earlier….and the prices of this low scale product have also gone very high…….we do have plenty of low grade lignite available……is there any process to recover humic acid from this besides the russian process of grinding the low qua;ity lignite to 200 mesh and than adding 4 to 8 parts water and 4 % nitric acid , mixing and heating it to 200 degrees centugrade , than cooling it ???????
Nitric acid is ideal for oxidising lignite to humic acid. Allowing the lignite to oxidise in air by allowing it to stand for 1 yr is also used.
The extraction process also has a big influence on the recovery. After adding the sodium/potassium hydroxide, allow the mixture to stand for 1-2 days with agitation to obtain better extraction efficiency. Repeating the extraction two or three times will also increase the recovery.
Hi,
Your site is very interesting. I have been working with both humic and fulvic acid and I was wondering if it is possible to convert humic acid into petroleum? Since it is a precursor to petroleum and crude oil, then would a simple decarboxylation reaction form petroleum by-products in the humic acid?
How would this be accomplished? Is this a chemical reaction or can it be done using microbials?
Thanks and a reply will be appreciated!
Regards,
Marc
Comment by Marc Rodriguez — 2009 @ 11:45 am
Hi,
Your site is very interesting. I separating humic acid from soils to study interaction of pesticides with humic acid in order to understand the retention of pesticides on soil and thereafter their degaradation behaviour. Is it neccessary to pass the extracted humic acid through DOWEX resin for its purification? If it is what is its eluant? I lack exact methodology for purification.
Waiting for you reply.
Thanks
Regards
Anirudh
Comment by Anirudh — 2009 @ 3:16 pm
Hello Anirudh
Since you are want to determine the degradation of pesticides with humic acids in soil, I suggest that you do not purify the humic acid. The reason for this is that you may obtain results for pure humic acid that are not relevant to soil situations, i.e. it may be too pure. In soils humic acid is complexed to many substances (including clay and metal ions) and this “mixture” determines its properties, which will be different to pure humic acid. However, if you wish to obtain very pure humic acid, this is the procedure that I have used:
1. Extract soil with 0.1 M sodium hydroxide and separate the liquid
2. Filter through a 0.4 micron filter to remove particles that will recombine with humic acids in the next step
3. Adjust pH to ~1 with hydrochloric acid
4. Extract with n-butanol
5. Evaporate n-butanol under vacuum with heating
I have never used the Dowex method for humic acids, but I have used the XAD-7 method for fulvic acids which requires ethanol or ethanol/ ammonia for elution.
Regards
Michael
Comment by humicacid — 2009 @ 4:50 pm
Vuestro procedimiento para separar acidos humicos es el mismo para separar de la loombriz de tierra Eisenia foetida.
Muchas gracias
Comment by socorro — 2009 @ 12:33 am
Por favor deme detalles de su procedimiento.
Comment by humicacid — 2009 @ 12:19 pm
Dear Mr Susic
We have started the fabrication of a Sodium/Potaasium Humate planr and after fabricating close to 80 % we realised that the leonardite deposits in our region have been depleted due to extensive purchase by other factories..now only low grade leonadite with about 30 % humic acidn is available as opposed to 65% earlier….and the prices of this low scale product have also gone very high…….we do have plenty of low grade lignite available……is there any process to recover humic acid from this besides the russian process of grinding the low qua;ity lignite to 200 mesh and than adding 4 to 8 parts water and 4 % nitric acid , mixing and heating it to 200 degrees centugrade , than cooling it ???????
Regards
Tariq Gondal
Comment by Mineral Valley Pvt Ltd — 2009 @ 10:40 pm
Hello Tariq
Nitric acid is ideal for oxidising lignite to humic acid. Allowing the lignite to oxidise in air by allowing it to stand for 1 yr is also used.
The extraction process also has a big influence on the recovery. After adding the sodium/potassium hydroxide, allow the mixture to stand for 1-2 days with agitation to obtain better extraction efficiency. Repeating the extraction two or three times will also increase the recovery.
Regards
Michael
Comment by humicacid — 2009 @ 3:03 pm