An estimated 168 billion gallons of wastewater — or produced water — is generated annually by the Permian Basin fracking industry, in keeping with a 2022 report by the Texas Produced Water Consortium. The main waste stream has proved each difficult and dear to treat due to the chemical complexity of the water.
In a brand new study published within the journal Water, researchers at The University of Texas at El Paso have identified a novel technique of treating the wastewater generated by oil and gas production: bacteriophages.
Ramón Antonio Sánchez, a doctoral candidate inside UTEP’s chemistry program, is the primary creator on the publication, detailing how bacteriophages, viruses which might be often highly specific and lethal to a single species of bacteria, could be used as a rapid and cost-effective method to treat produced water on an industrial scale.
Sánchez said if the work is successful, it could give the oil and gas industry a method of treating, reusing and recycling produced water, relatively than the present industry practice of disposing nearly all of produced water by injecting it into the bottom post oil exploration.
The research focuses on two of probably the most outstanding bacteria found inside produced water across the oil and gas industry — Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Bacillus megaterium. P. aeruginosa has the power to corrode chrome steel and presents a challenge for the longevity of pipelines and other metal-based infrastructure, while B. megaterium, can decompose hydrocarbons — the idea for oil.
Sánchez, together with one among his collaborators, Zacariah Hildenbrand, Ph.D., a UTEP alum, were inspired to make use of bacteriophages based on their applications within the medical industry, where they’re used to combat infections attributable to multi-drug resistant bacteria.
“For the reason that bacteria live organisms, over time they developed a resistance, in the shape of a less penetrable membrane, to traditional disinfectants,” Sánchez explained. “However the bacteriophages, that are viruses themselves, attach to specific receptors on the surface of the host cell and evolve alongside the bacteria they are attempting to contaminate, meaning that any resistance acquired by the bacteria triggers the modification of bacteriophages to maintain the infection going.”
The team’s experiments with bacteriophages have been effective, achieving the inactivation of each P. aeruginosa and B. megaterium in laboratory settings. For Sánchez, who graduates this spring together with his Ph.D., the work will proceed within the industry where his focus shall be on replicating his laboratory results out in the sector. He can even attempt to expand the variety of microorganisms that could be treated in produced water by securing a bigger catalog of bacteriophages.
The team admits the approach does have its challenges. There are currently a limited amount of commercially available Bacteriophages, which is critical since bacteriophages are sometimes highly specific to a single species of bacteria. There are also other species of bacteria in produced water that remain to be tested.
