Water-in-Diesel Nano-Emulsion: A Preliminary Study on Its Formation and Short Term Physical Stability

Abstract

Water-in-diesel nano-emulsions were developed using blended nonionic surfactants i.e. Span 20 and Tween 80 in this study. With optimal HLB number (i.e. 11.16), emulsions with varying water wt% (2 wt% - 8 wt% of water, at 6 wt% surfactant) and varying surfactants wt% (2 wt% - 8 wt%, at 5 wt% water) were particularly studied for their characteristic size. From the results obtained, droplet size increases with the increase of water wt%, but generally decrease with increase of surfactant wt%. Water content ranging from 2 wt% to 5 wt% were prepared for short term physical stability study. Generally, no phase separation was observed. Neither significant increase nor decrease in term of droplets size was recorded for emulsions prepared at 2 wt% and 3 wt% of water, after 15 days of storage at room condition.