GREEN CHEMISTRY

HOW TO IMPROVE OILFIELD OPERATIONS WITHOUT SACRIFICING SUSTAINABILITY

By Martin Shumway, PE, CPG, Technical Director, Locus Bio-Energy Solutions

Winston Churchill once said the allies floated to victory on a sea of oil during the first world war.

But now the oil industry is fighting its own war against a multitude of challenges. Employment is declining. Operators are doing what they can to survive while pressure builds from investors and shareholders to operate within cashflow and achieve returns on investment. There is also pressure to increase sustainability and implement ESG criteria across operations. It can feel like an impossible feat in such a volatile market. So, what can be done to remain competitive in the oilfield? The answer may surprise you.

CUTTING COSTS WITH BIOSURFACTANTS

Operators across top U.S. basins are finding success using new oilfield technology that incorporates green biosurfactants – both in financial and environmental benefits. Biosurfactants are a special class of surfactants that offer lower toxicity and higher biodegradability. The solutions are replacing standard synthetic petrochemical-based surfactants in oilfield applications at a fraction of the cost by reducing dosage rate, improving oil production, reducing expenses and minimizing the need for new drilling – acting as a minimal capex method to improving top and bottom lines. Biosurfactants offer a green solution that beats traditional chemical surfactants in performance, cost and sustainability – allowing operators to increase production revenue while also excelling in ESG compliance.

In addition to their green profile, biosurfactants are highly effective as excellent wetting agents and have low critical micelle concentrations (minimum effective dosage rates), which reduce surface and interfacial tensions to extremely low levels. They have been shown to reduce surface tension of water to below 35 mN/m, at doses 1/50th of chemical surfactants, are fast-acting, and offer sustained performance.

The advantages of biosurfacants come from their multiple action mechanisms, including reducing crude oil viscosity, dispersing blockages and changing interfacial tensions and oil/water contact angles. These mechanisms increase effective permeability and mobilize oil that would not be produced in the primary production phase, ultimately increasing production. Biosurfactant-based products have been shown to be effective in paraffin dispersion, completions chemistries and for enhanced oil recovery applications.

Biosurfactants are one of the most promising opportunities in green oilfield chemistry, but historically commercial use has been limited to personal care and other high-margin markets.

ADVANCEMENTS IN TECHNOLOGY

So how do these new technology advancements enable the large-scale production of biosurfactants? Unlike previous techniques, the new manufacturing technology enables creation of complex organic molecules that cannot be synthesized by traditional synthetic chemical methods. This method eliminates traditional biosurfactant recovery and purification stages, replacing them with bioinformatics and biotechnological fermentation processes that rapidly create pure and homogenous biosurfactants.

The process starts by identifying non-bacterial microorganisms with the appropriate gene clusters that can produce high yields of the most effective biosurfactants. Then, proprietary modular fermentation systems are used to customize small, highly concentrated batches of the biosurfactants at up to 100x the density of other products and at as little as 10% of standard production costs, lowering usage rates and treatment pricing. The technology also allows treatments to be customized for different reservoirs and blended at regional locations, ensuring consistent results.

RESULTS FROM THE OILFIELD

This new generation of biosurfactants offers alternatives to miscible gas injection with higher unconventional EOR efficiency, better flow assurance and low capex. The biosurfactant solutions are injected at low dosage rates into the reservoir in a controlled cyclic imbibition, where the biosurfactant solution is pumped into the well, allowed to soak for 4-24 hours and then allowed to flow back. The action of the biosurfactant mobilizes otherwise immobile oil. Conventional tight sand reservoirs and unconventional shale wells treated in the Permian and Appalachian basins have shown sustained oil production increases of more than 45% in 90% of the treated wells, together with the elimination of flow assurance problems such as paraffin deposition.

Biosurfactant-based paraffin dispersal formulations for flow assurance have eliminated or minimized the use of BTEX solvents and other synthetic chemicals for several operators, while offering production increases attributed to near wellbore wettability changes and increases in effective permeability from cyclic applications.

DOING MORE WITH LESS

In today’s lower-price environment, the industry’s focus has turned to the total cost of operations and the need to function within operational cashflows. Flow assurance and production enhancement formulations aim to provide solutions that balance performance, environmental risks and requirements for cost reduction. With the introduction of biosurfactant solutions, the industry no longer has to choose between environmentally-friendly and effectiveness. Sustainability can now be the norm rather than the alternative.

The future of the oil industry is reliant on innovative technologies that can meet the growing demands of oil production and recovery. In a time when every dollar counts, using biosurfactant treatments can offer a sustainable solution to maintaining financial stability without sacrificing ESG advantages.

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Martin is a licensed Professional Engineer (PE.72266), Certified Petroleum Geologist (CPG #6025) through AAPG and an industry speaker with more than 20+ years of experience in the mining and petroleum industries. He currently oversees all Northeastern operations for the award-winning biosurfactant company, Locus Bio-Energy Solutions. He earned both his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Engineering from The Ohio State University.

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