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Feature 64 NOVEMBER 2014 COATINGSPROMAG.COM BY STEPHANIE MARIE CHIZIK PHOTOS COURTESY ELINERS AND R&R; OILFIELD CONSTRUCTION Containing the Sludge: Creation of an Oil Pit When someone talks about oil, especially in Texas, certain images might come to mind. W hether or not they're accurate, visions of black gold, 10-gallon (38 L) hats, and million-dollar yachts might be among those oil-related images. But the oil business is not all about keeping up with the Clampetts. It's also about some not-so-lovely things, such as oil sludge, drilling cuttings, and waste streams. And with the dirty stuf comes the cleanup, which is where this particular second- ary containment part of the oil industry story comes into play. A lthough, unlike the Beverly Hillbillies, this story features a diferent kind of star: polyurea. Dem Bones Te bones of the oil industry can be drilled down into a minutia, and this drilling system in particular called for quite a niche system. Consider this: Drilling for oil creates waste streams. Te waste streams are connected to a waste management system. Te waste management system's connected to transporting the solid wastes. And the trucks, which transport the solid wastes from the drilling site, are connected to another system that separates and removes the sludge and cuttings out of the liquid before it can reenter the soil. It's that last bit — the treat- ment system — that brought the Graham, Texas-based R&R; Oilfeld Construction (RROC) to the jobsite. It was up to RROC's four-person crew to help the client, Trisun Energy Services, set up its station for removing the oil waste from their trucks. Te station, which was referred to as the "pit," is located at the Eagle Ford, Texas, facility. Trisun had a concrete contain- ment system constructed on site, but they'd need help getting it going and keeping it in working condition. "Typical concrete pit structures utilized in the oilfeld are utilized for the primary containment of fuids," explained Coatings Application Manager Don Rogers of RROC. "Te second- ary [containment] has customarily been an HDPE [high-density polyethylene] liner (sheet product) installed under the concrete pit to catch any fuids that might cause contamination of the surrounding soils." But according to their website, RROC, which handles "oilfeld construction, consulting, maintenance, and OTHER POLYUREA CONCRETE