Metagenomic analysis of microbial communities in hydrocarbon resource environments. hydrocarbon metagenome

Fossil fuels will remain a large part of the world’s energy use for the foreseeable future. In order to chart a route to more efficient and environmentally friendly production technologies, the Hydrocarbon Metagenomics Project has compared microbial community compositions in oil sands, oil sands tailings ponds, conventional oil fields and coal bed methane operations. Although anaerobic microbial communities predominated in water-saturated regions from field sites, suggesting growth by water-requiring methanogenic hydrocarbon degradation, aerobic microbes predominated in dry core samples from oil sands and coal bed methane fields, suggesting growth by water-producing hydrocarbon oxidation. This has significant consequences for stimulating anaerobic, microbial conversion of oil to methane and coal bed methane production, as water may often be the limiting nutrient in these biotechnologies.