microbial enhancement of oil recovery—recent advances, Proceedings of the 1990 international conference on microbial enhancement of oil recovery

512 Pages·1991·9.737 MB·English

by  Erle C. Donaldson (Eds.)

DEVELOPMENTS IN PETROLEUM SCIENCE
Advisory Editor: G.V. Chilingarian
Volumes 1,3,4,7a nd 13 are out of print.
2. W.H. FERTL - Abnormal Formation Pressures
5. T.F. YEN and G.V. CHILINGARIAN (Editors) - Oil Shale
6. D.W. PEACEMAN - Fundamentals of Numerical Reservoir Simulation
8. L.P. DAKE - Fundamentals of Reservoir Engineering
9. K. MAGARA - Compaction and Fluid Migration
10. M.T. SILVIA and E.A. ROBINSON - Deconvolution of Geophysical Time Series in the
Exploration for Oil and Natural Gas
11. G.V. CHILINGARIAN and P. VORABUTR - Drilling and Drilling Fluids
12. T.D. VAN GOLF-RACHT - Fundamentals of Fractured Reservoir Engineering
14. G. MOZES (Editor) - Paraffin Products
15A. 0. SERRA - Fundamentals of Well-log Interpretation, 1. The acquisition of logging data
15B. 0. SERRA - Fundamentals of Well-log Interpretation, 2. The interpretation of logging
data
16. R.E. CHAPMAN - Petroleum Geology
17A. E.C. DONALDSON, G.V. CHILINGARIAN and T.F. YEN (Editors) - Enhanced Oil
Recovery, I. Fundamentals and analyses
17B. E.C. DONALDSON, G.V. CHILINGARIAN and T.F. YEN (Editors) - Enhanced Oil
Recovery, 11. Processes and operations
18A. A.P. SZILAS - Production and Transport of Oil and Gas, A. Flow mechanics and
production (second completely revised edition)
19A. G.V. CHILINGARIAN, J.O. ROBERTSON Jr. and S. KUMAR - Surface Operations in
Petroleum Production, I
19B. G.V. CHILINGARIAN, J.O. ROBERTSON Jr. and S. KUMAR - Surface Operations in
Petroleum Production, I1
20. A.J. DIKKERS - Geology in Petroleum Production
21. F. RAMIREZ - Application of Optimal Control Theory to Enhanced Oil Recovery
22. E.C. DONALDSON, G.V. CHILINGARIAN and T.F. YEN - Microbial Enhanced Oil
Recovery
23. J. HAGOORT - Fundamentals of Gas Reservoir Engineering
24. W. LITTMANN - Polymer Flooding
25. N.K. BAIBAKOV and A.R. GARUSHEV - Thermal Methods of Petroleum Production
26. D. MADER - Hydraulic Proppant Fracturing and Gravel Packing
27. G. DA PRAT - Well Test Analysis for Naturally Fractured Reservoirs
28. E.B. NELSON (Editor) - Well Cementing
29. R.W. ZIMMERMAN - Compressibility of Sandstones
Developments in Petroleum Science, 31
microbial enhancement
of oil recovery
=
recent advances
Proceedings of the 1990 international conference on microbial
enhancement of oil recovery
Edited by
ERLE C. DONALDSON
402 S. Taylor Avenue, Wynnewood, OK 73098, U.S.A.
ELSEVIER, Amsterdam - Oxford - New York - Tokyo 1991
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0 Elsevier Science Publishers B.V., 1991
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V
DEDICATION
These Proceedings are dedicated to the late Dr. Claude ZoBell whose
pioneering work with microbial release of oil from sands has blossomed into
world-wide field application of the diverse technologies known as microbial
enhancement of oil recovery which are presented in this volume.
1
PREFACE
This is the third conference that has been sponsored by the Bartlesville
Project Office of the U.S. Department of Energy (as well as two workshops):
The first conference, in 1982, was designed to explore the nature
of the international interest in microbial enhanced oil recovery
(MEOR). We found that there was a great deal of interest in MEOR,
but that it was directed principally to laboratory studies;
Therefore the objective of the Second Conference, in 1984, was to
discuss field applications of MEOR. Several small companies were
using MEOR and there were rumors that some of the major oil
companies also were looking at it, but papers on field activities
did not materialize;
This conference, once more, was instituted to examine field
activities in MEOR. The U.S. Department of Energy has sponsored
several field projects and the details from some of these were
presented, as well as a few from industry. The balance of the
program was concerned with new developments in research.
MEOR had its beginning with the suggestion by Beckman in 1926 that
certain microbes might be useful for enhancement of petroleum recovery. At
the time no one was particularly interested in MEOR because there was a
surplus of oil. In the 1930's and 1940'9, Dr. ZoBell (1947) led the way with
several interesting experiments and ideas that formed the actual basis for
MEOR. In the 1950's it was Drs. Updegraff (1954) and Hitzman (1956) who
published papers on MEOR in the United States.
Later, in 1967, Dr. Davis published a book on petroleum microbiology
where he reviewed field work being conducted in Eastern European countries,
and patents and papers, that had appeared in the literature. In the 1970's we
began to hear about the work that Dr. Lazar (1978) was conducting in Romania.
In 1979, the U.S. Department of Energy entered the field by holding a
forum on MEOR in San Diego, California (1979). It was held in San Diego
because Dr. ZoBell (then retired) said that he would attend the forum if it
could be held there. He did attend, and the results of that 3-day forum
developed into the extensive research program of the U.S. Department of Energy
which has led to this conference.
Today's oil production technology leaves one third to one half of the
original oil in place in the reservoir at abandonment of secondary recovery
.
(waterflooding) This leaves a very large target for microbial enhanced oil
recovery which was shown by the research papers of this conference to be
capable of producing up to 50% of the residual oil. The field trials show
that the normal projected oil production decline curve can be reversed, or
leveled off, by MEOR. The art of MEOR is too young to show the ultimate field
oil recovery that can achieved by MEOR. The trends thus far, however, are
encouraging enough to stimulate more small field trials and even entire
oilfield applications.
This conference has shown that a variety of applications are possible to
correct oilfield problems as well as to enhance oil recovery. Among these is
the suppression of hydrogen sulfide production which alone is a tremendous
advance because of the large quantity of sour oil production. If hydrogen
sulfide production can be curtailed it would increase the value of the
produced oil, decrease it toxicity, and largely decrease it corrosiveness.
All of these would be welcome both in the field and at the petroleum refinery
where special precautions must be taken to process sour crude oil.
Another very important discovery is the ability of certain bacteria to
eliminate paraffin deposition around the producing well and in the tubulars.
This is a welcome improvement for many producers who have considerable
difficulty in controlling paraffin deposition.
MEOR research has apparently taken a turn to more applied aspects than
the very basic processes of MEOR. A considerable amount of discussion,
however, was devoted to analyses of the probably mechanisms of MEOR and the
physiology of MEOR bacteria.
The papers were organized into: Introduction, Research, Field and an
Appendix in which Dr. Lazar present a condensed review of 30 field trials that
have been fairly well documented.
This Appendix can serve as a quick review of published field results and
a guide for selection of an appropriate field procedure (or protocol) for a
specific field. The papers in each section were numbered; for example,
Research Paper No. 5 was labeled R-5 and Field Paper No. 3 is F-3. This
convention was adopted to afford the reader more rapid reference to the
papers.
REFERENCES
Beckman, J. W., 1926. The Action of Bacteria on Mineral Oil. Ind. Eng. Chem.
News, 4 (Nov 10): 3.
Davis, J. B., 1967. Petroleum Microbioloav. Elsevier Science publishers,
Amsterdam, New York, 604 pp.
Hitzman, D. O., 1956. Recovery of Oil from Oil Sand and the Like. U.S.
Patent No. 2,907,389.
Lazar, I., 1978. Microbial Methods in Secondary Oil Recovery. European Spp.
on EOR. Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, (Aug 29-Sep I), VII: 5-7.
3
Science Applications Staff Report, 1979. conference on Microbiolouical
Processes Useful in EOR. Final Report, Sand Diego, California, CONF
790871 (UC-92), NTIS, Springfield, VA 22161, 54 pp.
Updegraff, D.M. and Wren, G.B., 1954. The Release of Oil from Petroleum-
Bearing Materials by Sulfate-Reducing Bacterial. Appl. Microbiology, 2:
309-322.
ZoBell, C. E., 1947. Bacteria Release of Oil from Oil-Bearing Materials,
Parts I and 11. World Oil, 126(13), 36-47 (I); 127(1) : 35-41 (11).
Erle C. Donaldson
5
INTRODUCTION
The introduction to the Proceedings is composed of four introductory
papers beginning with the address by the Director of the Department of Energy
Bartlesville Project Officer, Mr. Thomas C. Wesson. This is followed by the
Keynote Address which was presented by Dr. Donald 0. Hitzman, President of
INJECTECH INC.
DK. Vivian Moses presented a provocative speech which, in a way, was a
challenge to the Conferees - why is it that MEOR is Still in the formative
stage when proof of its success has so often been shown from both laboratory
and field results?
Finally, Drs. Qin and Yang presented an overview of MEOR developments in
China which was more appropriate as an introductory presentation.
Reprinted from: Microbial Enhancement of Oil Recovery - Recent Advances, 7
edited by E.C. Donaldson
0 Elsevier Science Publishers B.V., Amsterdam - Printed in The Netherlands
CH. 1-1
ADDRESS BY THE DIRECTOR OF THE DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY, BARTLESVILLE PROJECT
OFFICE
Thomas C. Wesson
Thank you, Erle. It's always a pleasure to attend an event at the
University of Oklahoma--the facilities and hospitality are first rate. A lot
of time and effort goes into preparing a meeting like this, and you and Leon
Crowley have done a great job in arranging a successful conference.
The Department of Energy appreciates the University of Oklahoma's
commitment and support for MEOR. The faculty and staff have been leaders in
MEOR research, both in laboratory and field projects, and the University has
been a co-sponsor of several MEOR conferences since 1982.
It is particularly gratifying to see the strong international
participation here today--we have MEOR experts from a dozen countries and all
six inhabited continents. If it had oil wells, I'm sure someone would have
been here from Antarctica, too. Your attendance here denotes the global
nature of MEOR, an aspect that has been growing with every gathering over the
last decade.
Since our last meeting, a MEOR workshop sponsored by DOE and NIPER at
Bartlesville in 1987, we have seen some encouraging signs. The agenda at this
conference is one indication--42 technical presentations, compared to 19 in
1987. More research is being done, more field projects are being performed,
and we are obtaining more results across a wider range of MEOR topics.
DOE funding for MEOR research has been substantially increased--more
than tripled since 1987, in fact. And MEOR research, itself, has made
significant progress in furthering our knowledge of the basic processes of
MEOR, as I'm sure we'll see during the technical sessions over the next few
days.
But the news is not all good:
1. The price of oil is still uncomfortably low, which inhibits the
application of enhanced recovery projects;
2. U.S. domestic oil production is still dropping; where it was at one
time 213 of domestic consumption, the U.S. is now producing less than
112 of its consumption;
8
3. A recently completed DOE study reveals that a stripper well
abandonment rate of 17-18,000 per year threatens future access to a
significant portion of our oil resources.
This last fact is a particularly sobering one for the future of EOR in
general. Successful application of EOR requires economic access to the
reservoir, and there is no economic access to a field of abandoned, plugged
wells. It's imperative that we curtail well abandonments in order to save the
future of EOR. We must use every resource available to us, and appropriately
enough, one of those particularly relevant resources is MEOR itself!
MEOR processes are especially useful here because:
1. They are applicable to shallow waterflooded "stripper fields", a
group of fields that contain a lot of remaining oil but have been
resistant to other EOR technologies;
2. They use the existing field infrastructure (wells and equipment) and
personnel;
3. They are not capital intensive.
(These three characteristics make these processes especially suited to
independents. )
and,
4. They are environmentally benign--using non-toxic injectants while
consuming little energy themselves in the process.
We can see, then, that there are significant problems on the immediate
horizon for the future of domestic oil production, and MEOR holds promise for
providing some of the solutions. DOE will examine the results of this
conference as we have previous such meetings to see how MEOR will measure up
to the challenge. We will be looking for:
1. Areas for future research that will refine and build upon results
already obtained, or broaden MEOR applicability;
2. Laboratory determination of the feasibility of techniques suitable
for field validation and testing;
3. Improved understanding of the mechanisms of microbial systems that
have been used in field trials.
I mentioned a moment ago that MEOR was especially suitable for
independent operations. That has particular significance today, because the
Department has recently mounted an initiative to assist independent operators
to increase production and profitability from their marginal wells. For a
number of years DOE supported mainly long-term, high-risk research, but
several events have led to a shift to research with more immediate results
that can be applied directly in the oil field.