Microbial Enhanced Oil Recovery - The Environment of An Oil Reservoir

The Environment of An Oil Reservoir

Oil reservoirs are complex environments containing living (microorganisms) and non living factors (minerals) which interact with each other in a complicated dynamic network of nutrients and energy fluxes. Since the reservoir is heterogeneous, so do the variety of ecosystems containing diverse microbial communities, which in turn are able to affect reservoir behaviour and oil mobilization.

Microbes are living machines whose metabolites, excretion products and new cells may interact with each other or with the environment, positively or negatively, depending on the global desirable purpose, e.g. the enhancement of oil recovery. All these entities, i.e. enzymes, extracellular polymeric substances (EPS) and the cells themselves, may participate as catalyst or reactants. Such complexity is increased by the interplay with the environment, the later playing a crucial role by affecting cellular function, i.e. genetic expression and protein production.

Despite this fundamental knowledge on cell physiology, a solid understanding on function and structure of microbial communities in oil reservoirs, i.e. ecophysiology, remains inexistent.