EXPLAINING OBT® OIL DEGRADATION TREATMENT

Bioremediation and OBT® - The Product and Technology

OBT® contains compounds of naturally occurring bacteria and enzymes coupled with adapted microbial nutrients used to bioremediate hydrocarbons. Bioremediation is the process of using microbial agents to convert or degrade organic compounds such as crude oil and gasoline into non-toxic substances such as carbon dioxide and water. While the term bioremediation implies a process used to treat or remedy effluents, that is, waste material which has been discharged into the environment, applications of these products include use in a controlled, typically industrial, environment. Potential applications thus include:

• Clean-up of massive environmental disasters such as open water oil spills and oil tanker break-ups.
  
• Soil and groundwater hydrocarbon contamination.
  
• Breakdown of diesel range organics and gasoline range organics in a bioremediation system.

The efficiency of bioremediation is demonstrated most dramatically by nature itself. Through the process commonly known as the "carbon cycle" nature recycles organic compounds. For example, while millions of dollars have been spent on the clean-up of the Prince William Sound, site of the Exxon Valdez oil spill, by many reports the current surprisingly good state of the area is attributable in not insignificant part to natural causes, including bioremediation.

Many thousands of different species of bacteria exist in the world, and most sustain bacterial digestion in some way. Any given bacteria, however, may occur naturally in only a limited environment, require specialized food sources or have a unique biological role. In most cases naturally occurring organisms are not in sufficient concentrations to produce a complete or prompt result. Thus, there exists an opportunity to enhance and accelerate the natural process by the introduction of additional microbes and nutrients.

The art in the development of bioremediation products is in the selection and combination of microbes and nutrients. The goal is to identify a compound which produces a sustained chemical reaction, breaking down in stages the complex and harmful contaminant into simple and harmless molecules and base elements. For reasons of both principle and pragmatism only naturally occurring, non-genetically manipulated microorganisms were considered for inclusion in the OBT® formula. Initially, a selection of microbes were isolated and evaluated in the laboratory to identify their respective abilities to degrade specific chemical structures.

Further experimentation was conducted to test the interaction of the microbes with environmental variables. Finally (in a process not nearly as sequential as it sounds) additional efforts were made to identify both the strains of microbes which produced the best result at various points in the process (for differing complex molecules need to be broken down at various junctures) and the energy sources from which the microbes could feed to sustain that process. The results are bioaugmentation compounds containing microorganisms which work in concert, possessing the bacteriological and enzymatic systems necessary to degrade targeted contaminants in a manner both effective and cost efficient in a number of applications.

These products take the form of a free-flowing powder activated by the introduction of warm water. In dry-form, the products remain stable for a period of at least two (2) years when stored in a cool and dry place. Test results indicate that the products are efficacious in remediating contamination of soil and water (both fresh and salt). Normative treatment of contaminated soils can be ex situ, in earthen dikes or through use of bioreactor equipment and in situ, treatment is done through land farming or direct spray application.

OBT® will:

• Resist toxic shocks (including sudden influx of hydrocarbons and limited concentrations of heavy metals).
  
• Be effective across a broad range of pH levels and temperature ranges.
  
• Have an extremely high residual bacterial count.
  
• Not generate hydrogen sulfide, thereby minimizing noxious odors.
  
• Be equally effective in salt and fresh water.