MICROBIAL ENHANCED OIL RECOVERY

by
U.V KISHORE(316106203011)
 INTRODUCTION
• Microbial enhanced oil recovery (MEOR) represents the use of microorganisms to
extract the remaining oil from reservoirs.
• This technique has the potential to be cost-efficient in the extraction of oil
remained trapped in capillary pores of the formation rock or in areas not swept
by the classical or modern enhanced oil recovery (EOR) methods, such as
combustion, steams, miscible displacement, caustic surfactant-polymers flooding,
etc.
• Thus, MEOR was developed as an alternative method for the secondary and
tertiary extraction of oil from reservoirs, since after the petroleum crises in 1973,
the EOR methods became less profitable.
• Starting even from the pioneering stage of MEOR (1950s) studies were run on
three broad areas, namely,
1. Injection
2. Dispersion, and
3. Propagation of microorganisms in petroleum
reservoirs; selective degradation of oil components to improve flow characteristics;
and metabolites production by microorganisms and their effects.
Primary production
• Oil exists in the small pores and in the narrow fissures and interstices
within the body of the reservoir rocks underneath the surface of the
earth.
• The natural pressure of the reservoir causes the oil to flow up to the
surface and provide the so-called primary production.
• The initial reservoir pressure is usually high enough to lift the oil up
to surface; however as oil production progresses, the reservoir
pressure is continually depleted to a point in which artificial lift or
pumping is required to maintain an economical oil production rate.
Secondary production
• As the reservoir pressure declines during primary production, a
critical point is reached when it is necessary to provide external
energy for the reservoir to achieve additional oil recovery, which is
termed secondary recovery.
• The extra energy can be introduced by,
1. Gas injection
2. Water flooding
Tertiary production or Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR)
• Generally, tertiary or enhanced oil recovery involves the extraction of
residual oil after the primary and secondary phases of production.

• At this stage, modern and technically advanced methods are

employed to either modify the properties of reservoir fluids or the
reservoir rock characteristics, with the aim of gaining recovery
efficiencies more than those obtained by conventional recovery
methods.
METHODS OF TERITIARY OIL RECOVERY
• Thermal processes
• Chemical methods
• Miscible displacement processes
• Microbial processes (MEOR)
Another tertiary method of oil recovery is
microbial enhanced oil recovery, commonly known as MEOR, which
nowadays is becoming an important and a rapidly developed tertiary
production technology, which uses microorganisms or their metabolites
to enhance the recovery of residual oil .
Outcomes
• So far, the outcomes of MEOR are explained based on two
predominant rationales:
• Increment in oil production: This is done by modifying the interfacial
properties of the system oil-water-minerals, with the aim of facilitating oil
movement through porous media.
• In such a system, microbial activity affects the
• Fluidity – 1. viscocity reduction
• 2. miscible flooding
• Displacement efficiency – 1. decrease of interfacial tension
2. increase of permeability
• Sweep efficiency – 1. mobility control
2. selective plugging and
• Driving force - reservoir pressure

• Reduce water cut. The indigenous microbes stimulated by the

injected microbial nutrients grow fast and selectively block the "thief
zones", divert the injected water to sweep the unswept oil
 History
• It was in 1926, when Beckam proposed the utilisation of microorganisms as
agents for recovering the remnant oil entrapped in porous media. First MEOR
patent granted to Updegraff and colleagues in 1957.
• In 1954, the first field test was carried out in the Lisbon field in Arkansas, USA.
The main type of field experiments developed in those countries consisted in
injecting exogenous microbes. In 1958, selective plugging with microbial
produced biomass was proposed by Heinningen and colleagues.
• The oil crisis of 1970 triggered a great interest in active MEOR research in more
than 15 countries. From 1970 to 2000, basic MEOR researech focused on
microbial and characterisation of oil reaservoirs.
• In 1995, a survey of MEOR projects in the USA showed that 81% of
the projects successfully increased oil production, and there was not
a single case of reduced oil production. Today, MEOR is gaining
attention owing to its low cost (less than $10 per incremental bbl) and
low CAPEX requirement, the operator does not need to invest in
surface facilities as traditional chemical or CO2 EOR, and can reduce
the number of infill drilling wells.
• Several countries indicated they might be willing to use MEOR in one
third of their oil recovery programs.
 MEOR APPLICATIONS IN INDIA
• For enhanced oil recovery from stripper wells, using microbes. TERI (The Energy
and Resource Institute) and IRS (Indian Revenue Service), ONGC have jointly
cultured a set of microbes that could survive temperatures as high as 90ºC, air
pressure up to 140 kilograms persquare centimeter, and strong salinity with
concentration levels ranging from 4% to 8%.
• Techniques used earlier for oil recovery employed microbes that could bear
temperatures only up to 65ºC. TERI and IRS, ONGC cultured these stronger
bacteria in simulated conditions of oil wells complete with high temperature, high
pressure, and heavy salt concentration. The product was successfully tested in oil
wells at Ahmedabad and Mehsana Assets and the rest, as they say, is history.
• IRS, ONGC along with TERI, in New Delhi have developed a new
bacterial consortium S2, for enhanced oil recovery and got a Joint
Patent -National and International (US, Canada and Russia).

• Also called the huff-puff method of oil recovery (it involves injecting
microbes and then sucking up oil); it extracts over three times the oil
than any other conventional process.
• This technology was initially implemented in 82 oil wells in ONGC,
Ahmedabad and Mehsana Assets. With encouraging results, OTBL
(a Joint venture between ONGC and TERI) has now implemented this
technology in additional 50 oil wells of Ahmedabad Asset and 5 oil
wells of Assam Asset of ONGC and 2 oil wells in Georgia.

• OTBL (ONGC and TERI Biotech Limited) is currently providing MEOR

technology to ONGC, OIL and other companies at commercial scale.
• The success rate in these wells has been very encouraging. In some
wells, production increased threefold. How did this happen?.
First, suitable bacteria that are heat loving (and can withstand a
temperature of 90ºC), approximately 0.5–1 micron in size and capable
of existing in oxygen-less brackish atmosphere were isolated. Second,
they cultured the microbes in bulk in an anaerobic bioreactor at 90
ºC.

• The bulk-produced microbes were then injected into the oil wells and
then the bacteria were allowed to proliferate in the reservoirs for 15–
20 days. During this time, the bacteria multiplied further and started
producing metabolite that pushes the oil out.
MEOR oil recovery mechanisms
• During the MEOR process, the components are mixed at surface facilities and
injected into the oil reservoir. Inside the reservoir,
• a. Formation of bioacids that could dissolve some of the minerals (i.e., clays,
carbonates, etc.) contained in the formation rocks. Rock dissolution increases
the porosity and permeabilityof the reservoir.
• b. Production of solvents and biogases, leading to lower oil viscosity that
facilitates oil displacement through the porous media.
• c. Formation of biosurfactants, biopolymers and other compounds, that could
interact with the crude oil by emulsifying the oil, reducing its viscosity, and
reducing the interfacial tension at the oil-water interface.
MICROBES USAGE

• When the types of microorganisms useful for different recovery

mechanisms are investigated, it can be seen that Pseudomonas,
Arthrobacter and some other aerobic bacteria are effective in
consuming hydrocarbons.
• And Clostridium, Bacillus and Desulfovibrio species can produce gases
and chemicals.
Microorganism, their metabolites and
applications in MEOR.
Advantages
• Injected microbes and nutrients are cheap; (the injection of microbes is out of
date. The new microbial EOR technology does not need to inject microbes to the
reservoir, but only inject nutrients to stimulate the indigenous microbes)
• Easy to handle in the field and independent of oil prices.
• Economically attractive for mature oil fields before abandonment.
• Increases oil production.
• Existing facilities require slight modifications.
• Easy application.
• Less expensive set up.
• Low energy input requirement for microbes to produce MEOR agents.
• More efficient than other EOR methods when applied to carbonate oil reservoirs.
• Microbial activity increases with microbial growth. This is opposite to the case of
other EOR additives in time and distance.
• Microbial nutrients are biodegradable and therefore can be considered
environmentally friendly.
Disadvantages
• Injectivity lost due to microbial plugging of the wellbore—to avoid
wellbore plugging, some actions must be taken such as filtration
before injection
• Dispersion or transportation of all necessary components to the
target zone.
• Optimization of the desired in-situ metabolic activity due to the effect
of variables such as pH, temperature, salinity, and pressure for any in-
situ MEOR operation.
• Isolation of microbial strains, adaptable to the extreme reservoir
conditions of pH, temperatures, pressure and salinity.
 Challenges in MEOR
• Primary and secondary oil recovery processes achieve on a worldwide basis an average
recovery of 33% of the original oil in place (OOIP); while the unrecovered oil (67%) might
be retained in the reservoir by viscous and/or capillary forces.
• Conventional chemicals, such as solvents and surface-active compounds (surfactants)
are used during chemical EOR applications. Solvents reduce the oil viscosity to improve
the oil mobility by overcoming viscous forces; while surfactants reduce the interfacial
tension between oil and rock or oil and waterovercoming capillary forces.
• These chemicals are added to the injection water and transported within the reservoir
during water flooding, however, the chemicals reach only the places where oil has
already been displaced by water; furthermore, the chemicals could be partially
consumed and/or retained within the rock formation before they reach the target area
in the reservoir for their intended use.
Environmental constraints
• Several factors are affect microbial growth and activity.
• In oil reservoirs, such environmental constraints permit the establishment of
criteria to assess and compare the suitability of various microorganisms.
• Those constraints may not be as harsh as other environments on Earth.
• For example, with brines the salinity is higher than Environmental constraints
that of sea water but lower than that of salt lakes.
• In addition, pressures up to 20 MPa and temperatures up to 85 °C, in oil
reservoirs, are within the limits for the survival of other microorganisms.
• Some environmental constraints creating selective pressures on cellular systems
that may also affect microbial communities in oil reservoirs are:
TEMPERATURE
• Enzymes are biological catalysts whose function is affected by a variety
of factors including temperature, which, at different ranges, may
improve or hamper enzymatic mediated reactions. This will have an
effect over the optimal cellular growth or metabolism. Such dependency
permits classification of microbes according to the range of
temperatures at which they grow. For instance: psychrophiles (<25 °C),
mesophiles (25–45 °C), thermophiles (45– 60 °C) and hyperthermophiles
(60– 121 °C). Although such cells optimally grow in these temperature
ranges there may not be a direct relationship with the production of
specific metabolites.
 Pressure

• The effects of pressure on microbial growth under deep ocean conditions

were investigated by ZoBell and Johson in 1949. They called those microbes
whose growth was enhanced by increasing pressure, barophilic. Other
classifications of microorganisms are based on whether microbial growth is
inhibited at standard conditions (piezophiles) or above 40 MPa
(piezotolerants). From a molecular point of view, the review shows that at
high pressures the DNA double helix becomes denser, and therefore both
gene expression and protein synthesis are affected.
Pore size/geometry
• One study has concluded that substantial bacterial activity is achieved when
there are interconnections of pores having at least 0.2µ diameter.It is
expected that pore size and geometry may affect chemotaxis. However, this
has not been proven at oil reservoir conditions.
pH
• The acidity of alkalinity has an impact over several aspects in living and non
living systems.
Surface charge
• Changes in cellular surface and membrane thickness may be promoted by pH
due to its ionization power of cellular membrane embedded proteins. The
modified ionic regions may interact with mineral particles and affect the
motion of cells through the porous media.
Other Factors:
• Enzymatic activity
• Oxidation potential
• Electrolyte composition, etc