Modelling and laboratory investigation of microbial enhanced oil recovery

A one-dimensional model was developed to simulate the process of enhanced oil recovery by microorganisms. The model involves five components (oil, water, bacteria, nutrient and metabolites), with adsorption, diffusion, chemotaxis, growth and decay of bacteria, nutrient consumption, permeability damage and porosity reduction effects. Experiments were conducted to identify the parameters affecting the transport and growth of three bacterial strains: Streptococcus, Staphylococcus and Bacillus in porous media. Several correlations were developed from the experimental laboratory data and were used in the simulator. Comparison between the experimental and simulated results emphasized the validity of the developed simulator and determined its degree of accuracy (average absolute relative error = 8.323%), The simulator was used to investigate the effects of indigenous bacteria, slug size, incubation time, residual oil saturation, absolute permeability, and injection flow rate on oil recovery. Results show that mon oil can be recovered by using Streptococcus with molasses as a medium. Oil recovery is sensitive to variation in concentration of injected indigenous bacteria, size of bacterial culture slug, incubation time and residual oil saturation. The change of absolute permeability, or injection flow rate, has Ilo effect on oil recovery efficiency by bacteria.