STWA’s technology suite is based on the reduction of viscosity of petrochemical fluids.  Particulate Matter Aggregation (PMA), also known as “The TAO Effect” is the scientific cornerstone of our technology, and promises to reduce operation costs for heavy industry on an unprecedented scale. 

By reducing the viscosity of Crude Oil and its derivatives, STWA’s AOT™ technology enables crude oil pipelines to operate more effectively, increasing daily throughput capacity and reducing power requirements and need for expensive chemical additives. 

Also using The TAO Effect, ELEKTRA™ enables diesel fuel injectors to atomize fuel more effectively, increasing engine efficacy, increasing engine power, increasing fuel economy and reducing emissions simultaneously.

AOT™ utilizes patented processes to treat crude oil within the transport pipeline network(s) to reduce interparticulate resistance and drag.  As treatment is deployed, resistance decreases, and flow increases in an efficient and cost-effective manner.

Applications include:
Crude oil extraction & delivery systems, including oil platforms, oil fields and pipeline transmission systems.

ELEKTRA™ employs patented innovations in uniform electric field technology to increase fuel efficiency, reduce emissions and improve performance in fuel injected diesel engines.  The technology can be installed across vehicle fleets to greatly improve overall fuel consumption and significantly reduce expenses. 

Applications include:
Diesel trucks, trains, marine vessels, military fleets and jet turbines.

Particulate Matter Aggregation (PMA) is the cornerstone of our technology. Crude oil and its derivatives are what is known as binary suspension fluids, meaning they have a base fluid with dissolved particulate matter held within.

These dissolved particles when rubbing together create drag within the fluid, increasing the overall viscosity and making it more difficult to pump and spray into droplets.

What our technology does is to create short, precise electric pulse bursts within the fluid flow, forcing the particulate matter to align in the field direction.

When this happens, the particulate matters' natural tendency to combine into clusters is enhanced, enabling the total surface area per unit of dissolved particulate matter to decrease, giving more volume within the fluid for the dissolved particles to move, reducing their rubbing, thereby reducing viscosity.


The following excerpts are taken directly from:

Final Report:
Reducing the Viscosity of Crude Oil by Pulsed Electric and Magnetic Field

by
Professor Dr. Rongjia Tao
Department of Physics
Temple University
Philadelphia, PA
19122, USA
March 4th, 2008.
Click Here for Link to this Published Report

"Crude oil is a liquid suspension. the base liquid, consisting of small molecules for gasoline and diesel, has very low viscosity. In parrafin-base crude oi, at low temperature the high viscosity is mainly due to the suspended parrafin particles. In asphalt-base crude oil, at room temperature the asphalt in the crude oil absorbs moisture and solidifies into asphaltine particles since asphalt has a very high melting temperature. These asphaltene particles raise the effective viscosity of crude oil..."

"...The effective viscosity of a liquid suspension depends on the viscosity of the base liquid, the volume fraction and the size distribution of the suspended particles..."

"...Generally, the effective viscosity depends on how much freedom the suspended particles have in the suspension. The less freedom for the particles, the faster the energy dissapates and the higher the effective viscosity is. The mean free path of the spheres inside the suspension is given by (å/3ø), where å is the particle radius and ø is the total amount of dissoved particles. As å gets bigger, the mean free path becomes longer, indicating that the suspended particles have more freedom to move in the suspension, thus viscosity goes down..."

"...Other methods, such as adding chemical or gasoline to heavy crude oil, require the operation cost about $20.00 per barrel. however, our electric field and magnetic field method only cost about energy 0.002 KW-h per barrel. If [it costs] $0.1 for one KW-h, the operation cost is $0.002/barrel...."

"...We believe that this viscosity reduction method has a bright future for the oil industry."


To learn more, read our peer-reviewed, published physics white papers below.

Final Report Reducing the Viscosity of Crude Oil by Pulsed Electric and Magnetic Field.pdf

Electrorheology Leads to Efficient Combustion.pdf

Electric Field Assisted Fuel Atomization.pdf

Investigative Effects of Magnetic Fields on Fuels.pdf

Reducing the Viscosity of Crude Oil by Pulsed Electric and Magnetic Field.pdf

Particulate Matter Aggregation is important in two very basic, fundamental ways.

1. By reducing the viscosity of fluids, it requires less energy per unit volume to transport the fluid through pipelines.

2. Less viscous fluids enable a fuel injector to spray a finer mist of fuel droplets, enabling the fuel to burn more completely and cleanly.


These fundamental benefits have enormous implications for monetary, efficiency and ecological impact savings.

1. Crude oil is extremely thick and difficult to pump, requiring enormous amounts of energy to move the fluid from one location to another. Imagine trying to pull peanut butter through a beverage straw... Now imagine how much energy is used each day making that happen on an oil rig...

Our AOT™ technology can reduce the viscosity of:
API-11 crude oil by an average of 10.41%
API-21 crude oil by an average of 19.03%
API-15 crude oil by an average of 3.97%.
† All reductions in viscosity mentioned above are average percentage reductions for various tested paraeters of voltage, current and treatment times taken directly from Final Report: Reducing the Viscosity of Crude Oil by Pulsed Electric and Magnetic Field. (pages 9-10) Click Here for Report

The environmental impact from saving that amount of energy just getting the oil out of the ground is enormous.


2. Diesel fuel, when treated using our technology also shows viscosity reduction of approximately 10%. A thinner, reduced viscosity diesel when sprayed from a standard injector, is able to be dispersed in finer, smaller overall sized droplets. Finer droplets, (much like kindling in a fire as opposed to large logs,) are easier to burn, and do so more quickly and completely.

By burning the fuel droplets more quickly and completely, the engine is able to extract more power per unit volume of fuel, thereby requiring less fuel to do the same amount of work.

This enables the engine to use less fuel to achieve the same amount of work, increasing the fuel economy of the engine.

In addition, by burning the fuel more completely, the engine's exhaust is cleaner, adding a secondary benefit.

Our ELEKTRA™ technology enables this principle to be applied to diesel engines of all kinds, enabling fleet operators to have an easily implemented solution to their fuel economy and emissions needs.

Click Image to watch the engineering briefing

Click Image to watch side-by-side testing of ELEKTRA™

PMA is the basis for what makes our technology work. Its benefits are immediate, effective and provide benefits to the end user, the bottom line and the environment.

PMA is made possible by the scientific principle of Electrorheology, highlighted here in the following online article:
Click Here to learn more about electrorheology on HowStuffWorks.com

Our technology enables you and your fleet to save energy.

Saving energy reduces COGS.
Saving energy reduces margin risk.
Saving energy strengthens throughput efficacy.
Saving energy saves the environment.
Saving energy is a good idea, period.