Characteristics and performance evaluation of foam in situ generated by microorganisms

Foam can effectively improve reservoir heterogeneity, increase gas–liquid flow rate, reduce viscous fingering, and help to improve sweep efficiency. This paper mainly studies the characteristics and performance of microbial foam production, and proposes an enhanced oil recovery method for profile control by in situ microbial foam production. By optimizing the carbon and nitrogen sources of the medium, Pseudomonas aeruginosa PAO1 produced single and double rhamnolipids and biogas composed of N2, CO2, and CH4, and it could also produce foam in high salt, weak acid, and weak alkali environments. Gas injection experiments were carried out using self-produced biogas, the foaming effect is good in the range of gas–liquid ratio 1:1–3:1 and gas injection speed 20–40 ml/min, which was 71.43%–91.25% more than the foam volume produced by CO2 injection, and the foam production was positively correlated with the protein concentration of the foam. In the early stage of incubation, the foam was 20–100 μm in diameter, with high protein concentration and strong foam stability, which slowed down the drainage, polymerization, and disproportionation of the liquid film of the foam system. The foam performance test results show that the foam half-lifetime is long, up to 109 min. Foam culture medium has good viscosity reduction effect, emulsifying properties and less corrosive. The displacement experiment shows that the foam generated in situ by PAO1 in the core has good stability, reproducibility, and profile control performance, which can reduce the permeability of the core to half of the initial permeability and improve the reservoir heterogeneity. Therefore, microbial in situ foam production can be an effective method to enhance oil recovery in heterogeneous reservoirs, which is low cost, low pollution, and simple operation.