Bill Lantz, CEO of JGL Solutions, and Paul Wiseman, president of Fit to Print, explained microbial treatments in the oil and gas industry to Host Tyler Kern. The pair are hopeful in promoting the process’s many benefits when compared to traditional chemical treatments.

Lantz explained how scale and corrosion affects all aspects of the holding containers, like flowlines, tanks, filters and downhole injection sites. Comparing it to a film on your drinking glass, scale happens at a rate of nearly 100 times in the oil field, which causes major inefficiencies.

The main culprit? Oxygen and ions. Oxygen is a catalyst for corrosion, and there are several ions that cause issues downstream. Some of these ions include calcium carbonate, iron sulfide and iron oxide.

Currently, the leading treatment in the industry is to use harsh chemicals to prevent any further build up; however, chemicals can only prevent future build up and comes with many regulations due to its toxicity.

In contrast, microbial treatments provide a more cost-effective option that treats existing and prevents future scale and is sustainable. JGL analyzes many factors to determine the type of microbes to maintain about 1 million cells per 1 milliliter of fluid. Luckily, microbes reproduce and start a colony, making upkeep minimal.

This process saves customers an upward of 50% on tank cleaning, causes pressures to go down and flows to go up, improves water quality, and allows workers to focus on maintaining equipment instead of treating scale and corrosion.

Wiseman and Lantz encourage industry leaders to think long term since de-scaling existing buildups can take time. However, once the microbes break down the hard matter, customers will see significantly decreased filter changes.

Ultimately, “the proof is in the pudding, and in this case, the proof is in the de-scaling,” Wiseman confidently stated. Visit JGLSolutions.com to view the whitepaper and supplementing information.