Dedication This thesis is dedicated to my beloved parents, who supported me all the way since the beginning of my studies and offered me unconditional love throughout my life. I am always in their debt for their invaluable advice and inspiration. Abstract In the development of a non-aqueous bitumen extraction process, a major obstacle is solvent loss due to hydrocarbon attachment to the reject sand grains. A proposed solution to this problem is to wash (i.e. remediate) the oil-contaminated sand

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... grains with water and surfactants. This research is focused on developing a protocol to evaluate the performance of particular surfactant types and water chemistry; emphasis was placed on using minimal amounts of water to recover the residual oil. To start, a series of jar tests were conducted (using heptane and hexadecane as solvents) to study the phase behaviours of oil-water-surfactant ternary systems. This was followed by the development of a new washing protocol for the purpose of evaluating remediation performance. Finally, the correlation between overall remediation performance and the oil-water interfacial tension was discussed. going to climb it with you," Helen Steiner Rice (1900Rice ( − 1981. From the formative stages of this thesis, to the final draft, I owe an immense debt of gratitude to my supervisor, Dr. Tony Yeung for his precious advice and careful guidance. Without his friendly supervision, generous encouragement and patient guidance, this thesis would have never been written.