Abstract Venezuelan E & P industry carries out an important amount of waste-generating processes that make necessary to develop more appropriate methods for disposing of their waste. Some of these waste materials are emulsions formed by a mix of residues of crude oil, water, drilling muds and other agents. Microwave methods are able to destabilize water/oil emulsions by two means. First by increasing temperature, which reduces the continuous phase viscosity and breaks the outer film of the drops, thus allowing for coalescence; and second by rearranging the electrical charge distribution of the water molecules while rotating them, and moving ions around the drops. These two actions combined result in the breaking of the emulsion without adding any chemical agent. Aiming to mitigate the environmental hazard that these waste emulsions represent, a base study was carried in order to verify the phenomenon described above. The experimental work consisted on breaking the simplest of the emulsions in terms of content, in order to obtain preliminary data that can help to extend the method to manage actual waste material. The samples consisted in water/oil emulsions (with several W/O compositions) which have commercial lubricant basis as the oil phase. The results of the experimental work are temperature profiles and recovery factors of aqueous phase that describe the performance and efficiency of the method. The sample emulsions underwent a domestic microwave radiating process at several exposure times. Certain factors, such as aromatic components and sodium hydroxide content, emulsion mixing method and total heat exposure time proved to be the factors that more strongly affect the results. By using the microwave radiation exposure, results showed an aqueous phase recovery that ranged from 60 to 80 %, which is a significant outcome that reveals the study of this technique needs to be taken further.