This article, written by Technology Editor Dennis Denney, contains highlights of paper SPE 98568, "Significantly Enhanced Landfarm Performance Through the Use of Saline Water and Weekly Tilling," by A. Al-Mahruki, R. Al-Mueini, and Y. Al-Mahrooqi, Sultan Qaboos U.; A. Al-Sabahi, Petroleum Development Oman; G.H.P. Roos, The Petroleum Inst.; and H. Patzelt, Sultan Qaboos U., prepared for the 2006 SPE International Conference on Health, Safety, and Environment in Oil and Gas Exploration and Production, Abu Dhabi, UAE, 2-4 April. An experimental landfarm for the bio-remediation of petroleum hydrocarbon was constructed on the Fahud concession. From March to June 2005, the hydrocarbon content of the soil in the saline beds had fallen below 2%, while the control areas still contained more than 4%. Introduction Landfarming is an established process to reduce the petroleum content of contaminated soil through stimulated microbial degradation. The process is simple to design and operate, and it is relatively cost-effective. In southern Arabia, where large areas of land are available, the major remaining drawbacks are the long operating times of up to 2 years and the high water consumption of the process. The second problem is especially severe when fresh water is in short supply and must be transported over a long distance or must be produced by desalination on site. In the arid saline environments of the Arabian peninsula, the use of cheaper, brackish water for landfarming would be highly desirable, both for economic and ecological reasons. Such water had not been used previously because of the assumption that the microbial activity, and the associated biodegradation rate, decreases dramatically with rising salinity. This assumption was attributed to seemingly unfavorable physical properties of saline and hypersaline environments (>15% salt), such as the high dielectric constant, low free-water activity, low oxygen solubility, and, frequently, complete desiccation. However, successful demonstrations of xenobiotics degradation under hypersaline conditions have shown otherwise. It was shown, for instance, that by converting a former produced-water pit into an open-air bioreactor, bioremediation of even weathered hydrocarbon is possible in salt-saturated water. This study investigated an experimental landfarm, comparing hydrocarbon degradation and biological activity between beds that were irrigated with water of different salinities. The overall aim was to improve the existing landfarm operations in Oman and, as an added ecological asset, to reduce freshwater consumption at the remote Omani oil fields. Experimental Landfarm The Fahud concession is in the north-western part of the Sultanate of Oman, in an arid gravel desert approximately 250 km west of Muscat. As shown in Fig. 1, seven identical beds measuring 25×5 m, with a height of approximately 50 cm, were laid using fresh drilling mud, which had been diluted with sand to a total hydrocarbon concentration of 5.1 wt%.