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Low-Abundance Dietzia Inhabiting a Water-Flooding Oil Reservoir and the Application Potential for Oil Recovery.

ABSTRACT: With the development of molecular ecology, increasing low-abundance microbial populations were detected in oil reservoirs. However, our knowledge about the oil recovery potential of these populations is lacking. In this study, the oil recovery potential of low-abundance Dietzia that accounts for less than 0.5% in microbial communities of a water-flooding oil reservoir was investigated. On the one hand, Dietzia sp. strain ZQ-4 was isolated from the water-flooding reservoir, and the oil recovery potential was evaluated from the perspective of metabolisms and oil-displacing test. On the other hand, the strain has alkane hydroxylase genes alkB and P450 CYP153 and can degrade hydrocarbons and produce surfactants. The core-flooding test indicated that displacing fluid with 2% ZQ-4 fermentation broth increased 18.82% oil displacement efficiency, and in situ fermentation of ZQ-4 increased 1.97% oil displacement efficiency. Furthermore, the responses of Dietzia in the reservoir accompanied by the nutrient stimulation process was investigated and showed that Dietzia in some oil production wells significantly increased in the initial phase of nutrient injection and sharply decreased along with the continuous nutrient injection. Overall, this study indicates that Dietzia sp. strain has application potential for enhancing oil recovery through an ex situ way, yet the ability of oil recovery in situ based on nutrient injection is limited.

SUBMITTER: Gao P

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6791240 | biostudies-literature | 2019

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Project description:Low salinity waterflooding (low salinity-EOR) has attracted great interest from many giant oil producers and is currently under trial in some of the oil fields of the United States, Middle Eastern countries, and North Sea reservoirs. Most of the reported studies on this process were carried out for medium to relatively heavy oil with significant polar contents. In this work, we have investigated low salinity waterflooding performance for light paraffinic crude oil with a low acid number. This study has been performed using crude oil from an Indian offshore oilfield and Indian offshore seawater. Oil recovery efficiencies of seawater and its diluted versions (low salinity seawater) were evaluated through core-flooding experiments performed on a silica sand pack containing small amounts (2 wt %) of bentonite clay saturated with crude oil. Interfacial tension and wettability studies were performed to understand the associated low salinity effects on the crude oil/brine/rock properties. Effluent brine produced during the flooding experiments was also analyzed to obtain a clearer insight into the low salinity-enhanced oil recovery (EOR) mechanism. The results showed that injection of low salinity seawater can significantly increase the waterflood recovery in comparison with high salinity seawater injection. Interfacial tension and contact angle studies revealed that there is an optimum dilution level at which the interfacial tension and wettability are the most favorable for enhanced oil recovery even in the case of light paraffinic crude. These results are in line with the results obtained from the core-flooding experiments. The possible reason behind recovery improvement based on the interfacial tension and wettability studies in conjugation with the effluent brine analysis has been discussed in detail. In this study, we have observed that the enhanced oil recovery efficiency could be achieved by applying low salinity seawater flooding even in the case of light paraffinic oil with a low acid number.

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Low-Abundance Dietzia Inhabiting a Water-Flooding Oil Reservoir and the Application Potential for Oil Recovery.

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