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16 MARCH 2017 MATERIALS PERFORMANCE NACE INTERNATIONAL: VOL. 56, NO. 3 MATERIAL MATTERS Continued f rom page 15 entire microbial community found in oil and gas infrastructure environments. "A genome allows us to determine what kinds of genes these microbes have. If we know that, we can f igure out what they can do," Gieg says. She comments that only 1% of all microorganisms in the world can actually be cultured, so when a sample is cultured in a ty pical grow th- based test, the results are based on an extremely limited microbial community. Very little is known about the other 99%. "We can take bacteria from the f ield (e.g., from a sludge or process water sample) and try to grow them in a medium, but this doesn't account for all the genetic potential in that microbial community," Gieg adds. Part of the work will be discovering the behavior of microbes in the oil and gas infrastructure environments, and how their activities may lead to corrosion processes. "We know that microbes cause corrosion, but we are examining how they cause corrosion," says Faisal K han, proj- ect lead, head of the Department of Pro- cess Engineering, and director of C-RISE at Memorial University (St. John's, New- foundland and Labrador, Canada). "We will design experiments to address various corrosion questions, and see how the genes present may be respon- sible," says Gieg. For example, a reaction may be observed during a laboratory experiment, but the information on why this effect is being seen is not known. When this occurs, the researchers will look to see if there is a gene present in the genome that has the ability to cause the observed reaction. "Basically we're link- ing the two approaches—we're looking at what is happening chemically and what is present microbiologically that can poten- tially make it happen," she explains. The researchers will analyze solid and liquid samples from different pipelines and infrastructure at various oil f ields in multiple geographic regions. One of the big challenges they face is the develop- ment of a standard f ield sampling proce- dure that can be adopted by industry, says NACE member Tesfaalem Haile, a senior corrosion specialist and technical lead at InnoTech A lberta (Devon, A lberta, Canada). He notes that, as part of the project, a process will be developed early on for collecting samples from the f ield. "We will target sludge sampling for both microbiological and non-microbiological characterization, along with the develop- ment of optimal conditions for storage and transportation." The researchers anticipate three major outcomes from the research— knowledge, devices, and predictive mod- els. "Once we have a better understanding from that f irst experimental stage, then the project has phases that will focus on developing new tools for industry to detect and assess MIC, develop models for end users and integrity engineers to bet- Industrial insulation shaped by experts www.roxul-rti.com Experience our knowledge with ROXULASSIST ® , the online thermotechnical calculation tool This expert tool puts our extensive consulting skills and 75+ years of experience in the field of industrial insulation at your fingertips. Together, with our sustainable ProRox ® stone wool solutions, we can help you deliver the highest available protection against fire, heat, noise and energy loss while also reducing CO 2 emissions. Do the math and calculate the ideal insulation thickness with ROXULASSIST, our free online expert calculation program. Sign up at www.roxulassist.com or call (800) 265-6878 to help your business shape up. New ROXUL ASSIST online calculation tool EXPERT TOOL ROXULASSIST is available free of charge at www.roxulassist.com