Justification for the Research
Residents of wetlands like the Nigeria’s Niger delta are concerned about the environmental impact of residual oil spill into receiving surface waters and land. The adverse effect of oil spill to the ecosystem and the long term effect of environmental pollution call for an urgent need to develop a wide range of materials for cleaning up oil from oil impacted areas (Adebajo and Frost, 2004a). Absorbent materials are attractive for some applications because of the possibility of collection and complete removal of the oil from the oil spill site. The possibilities of cleaning oil pollution by sorbent on the basis of fibres, polymers and wood products, however, have not yet been sufficiently investigated (Nenkova et al., 2004). 5 No known work has been done on the acetylation of corn cob and mango kernel and its application in oil spill cleanup application. The potential input of this research, to the environment includes; 1. Treatment of water resources from oil spillage, thereby conserving the natural mangroves, water supply and reducing the incidence of forest wildfires which occurs as a result of accumulated crude oil residue in the mangroves 2. Conversion of undervalued agricultural waste residues, such as corn cobs and mango kernel to valuable sorption media which has the potential of providing economic incentives. 3. Application of the chemistry of the modification procedure in the development and improvement of other agro-based residues for several other applications. 4. Utilization of biodegradable materials for oil spill clean-up to provide sustainable operations and development. 5. Reduction of over dependence on imported products.