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1. Introduction
Natural gas hydrates are ice-like materials formed under low temperature and high
pressure conditions. Natural gas hydrates consist of water molecules interconnected
through hydrogen bonds which create an open structural lattice that has the ability to
encage smaller hydrocarbons from natural gas or liquid hydrocarbons as guest molecules.
Interest in natural gas hydrates as a potential energy resource has grown significantly in
recent years as awareness of the volumes of recoverable gas becomes more focused (Sloan &
Koh, 2008). The size of this resource has significant implications for worldwide energy
supplies should it become technically and economically viable to produce. Although great
efforts are being made, there are several unresolved challenges related to all parts in the
process towards full scale hydrate reservoir exploitation. Some important issues are: 1)
Localize, characterize, and evaluate resources, 2) technology for safe and economic
production 3) safety and seafloor stability issues related to drilling and production. This
chapter gives a brief introduction to natural gas hydrate and its physical properties. Some
important characteristics of hydrate accumulations in nature are also discussed.
Experimental results presented in this chapter emphasis recent work performed by the
authors and others where we investigate the possibilities for producing natural gas from gas
hydrate by CO2 replacement. By exposing the hydrate structure to a thermodynamically
preferred hydrate former, CO2, it is shown that a spontaneous conversion from methane
hydrate to CO2 hydrate occured. Several experiments have shown this conversion in which
the large cavities of hydrates prefer occupation by CO2 (Lee et al., 2003; Jadhawar et al. 2005;
Ota et al., 2005; Graue et al., 2008). This is also supported by simulations (Phale et al., 2006;
Kvamme et al., 2007). Other production schemes proposed in the open literature are also
reviewed in this chapter.
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148 Natural Gas
volume for the guest molecules. The size and shape of the guest molecule determines which
structure is formed due to volumetric packing considerations. Additional characteristics are
guest dipole and/or quadropole moments, such as for instance for H2S and CO2. The
average partial charges related to these moments may either increase the stability of the
hydrate (H2S) or be a decreasing factor in thermodynamic stability (CO2). SII forms with for
instance propane and iso-butane and sH with significantly larger molecules, as for instance
cyclo-hexane, neo-hexane. Both methane and carbon dioxide form sI hydrate. SI hydrates
forms with guest molecules less than 6 Å in diameter. The cages and the number of each
cage per unit cell are shown in Figure 1. SI cages are shown at the top of the figure. The unit
cell of sI hydrate contains 46 water molecules and consists of 2 small and six large cages. The
unit cell is the smallest symmetric unit of sI. The two smaller cavities are built by 12
pentagonal faces (512) and the larger of 12 pentagonal faces and two hexagon faces (51262).
The growth of hydrate adds unit cells to a crystal.
Fig. 1. Hydrate structures, from top: cages of sI, sII, and sH (Husebø, 2008)
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Natural gas hydrates 149
(drilling) which is very incomplete. Figure 2 shows the world’s occurrences of gas hydrate
both in permafrost regions and in marine sediments. Estimates of in situ hydrates range
from 3053*1015 m3 STP (Trofimuk et al., 1973), to 0.2*1015 m3 STP (Soloviev et al., 2002).
Estimates have generally decreased with time; however, even the most conservative exceed
the estimates of conventional gas (Sloan & Koh, 2008). A widely cited estimate is of 20*1015
m3, (Kvenvolden, 1988), which exceed the energy in conventional fossil fuels combined.
Fig. 2. Map of more than 90 documented hydrate occurrences (Hester and Brewer, 2009).
Indirect hydrate markers, as seismic reflectors and pore-water freshening in core samples
were used to identify the inferred hydrate deposits. Areas where hydrate samples have been
taken are marked as known hydrate deposits. Hydrate deposits are distributed in marine
environments and regions of permafrost.
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150 Natural Gas
Fig. 3. Hierarchy of production feasibility for gas hydrate resources (left) and conventional
gas (right) (Boswell and Collett, 2006)
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Natural gas hydrates 151
Gas Water
Water
Hydrate
Hydrate Hydrate
Dissociated Dissociated
Hydrate Dissociated Hydrate
DissociatedHydrate
Hydrate zone
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152 Natural Gas
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Natural gas hydrates 153
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154 Natural Gas
CH4 hydrates have a higher equilibrium pressure than that of CO2 hydrates for a range of
temperatures. A summary of these experiments is presented in Sloan & Koh, 2008. Figure 6
shows the equilibrium conditions for CO2 and CH4 hydrate in a P-T diagram. This plot is
produced using the CSMGem software (Sloan & Koh, 2008), which supplies the most recent
thermodynamic predictions.
100
Experimental
Conditions Stable CH4
hydrate
Stable CH4 hydrate
10 Stable CO2 hydrate
Pressure (MPa)
Outside hydrate
stability zone
0.1
-5 0 5 10 15
Temperature (°C)
Fig. 6. Stability of CH4 and CO2 hydrate (CSMGem software, Sloan and Koh, 2008).
Experimental conditions marks the P-T conditions for experiments presented in the next
section.
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Natural gas hydrates 155
An inherent limitation in this experiment is the absence of mineral surfaces and the
corresponding impact of liquids that may separate minerals from hydrates. These liquid
channels may serve as transport channels as well as increased hydrate/fluid contact areas.
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156 Natural Gas
and varying lengths between 6 and 10 cm, and the second arrangement had an open fracture
down the long axis of the core plug.
In
CO2 t
Ou MRI Magnet
Confining Pressure
Reciprocatin
Pump
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Natural gas hydrates 157
connected and a vacuum applied to the pore space of the core and spacer until
approximately 100 millitorr was reached, and then filled with methane gas. After the
methane was brought to 1200 psig, with the confining pressure concurrently increased to
ca.1700 psig, a pre-determined amount of water was pumped in to the fracture and imbibed
into the two core-halves to produce the desired saturation, ranging from 40 to 60% PV. The
water was imaged to determine both the quantitative amount and distribution. At 50% PV
the water-wet sandstone core imbibed the water, rapidly producing a fairly uniform vertical
and horizontal distribution throughout the core.
Water salinity varied from 0.1 to 5.0 weight percent NaCl corresponding to values
anticipated in permafrost-related hydrate deposits (Sloan and Koh, 2008). The presence of
salt, which acts as a hydrate formation inhibitor, ensured that not all of the water was
transformed into hydrate.
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158 Natural Gas
Fig. 9. Hydrate formation in a whole (left) and fractured (right) core plug core
formation of hydrate as a uniform loss of image with time. When cooled, hydrate formation
was identified as an abrupt increase of consumed methane and a corresponding drop in the
MRI Intensity. The correlation between the two independent measurements of hydrate
growth rate was excellent. The core sample was fractured to prepare for the next
experiment: measuring methane replacement by carbon dioxide. The right column in Figure
9 shows 3-dimensional MRI images obtained during the formation of methane hydrate in
the core halves split by the POM spacer as described in the previous chapter. The first image
(uppermost) shows water in the core plug halves and methane in the fracture prior to
hydrate formation. The methane in the fracture is visually separated from the water in the
plug partly due to the width of the fracture frame and partly due to the more uniform
appearance of the methane in the fracture compared to the mottled appearance of water in
the porous media. A downward growth pattern in each of the two core halves can be seen
from Figure 9. The last image shows that most of the water was converted to hydrates. The
open fracture can be seen filled with methane gas
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Natural gas hydrates 159
A B
- -
Time after CO2 flush: 0 hrs Time after CO2 flush: 112 hrs
- C -
D
Time after CO2 flush: 181 hrs Time after CO2 flush: 604 hrs
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160 Natural Gas
0.6
after 1st CO2 flush - duplicate experiments, Swi=50%
Molar methane consentration in fracture
0.5
0
0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700
Time (Hours)
Fig. 11. Methane produced from methane hydrate by CO2 replacement. Duplicate
experiments with Swi=50 % (5wt % NaCl) and one with Swi=50 % (0.1 wt % NaCl).
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Natural gas hydrates 161
10. Conclusion
The experimental set-up with the MRI monitoring apparatus was capable of forming large
quantities of methane hydrates in sandstone pores and monitor hydrate growth patterns for
various initial conditions. Spontaneous conversion of methane hydrate to carbon dioxide
hydrate occurred when methane hydrate, in porous media, was exposed to liquid carbon
dioxide. The MRI images did not detect any significant increase in signal in the hydrate
saturated cores that would indicate the presence of free water during the carbon dioxide
replacement.
11. Acknowledgements
The authors are indebted to the Norwegian Research Council and ConocoPhillips for
financial support and thank Jim Stevens, James Howard and Bernie Baldwin for their
contribution in acquiring the MRI data.
12. References
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Natural Gas
Edited by Primož PotoÄÂnik
ISBN 978-953-307-112-1
Hard cover, 606 pages
Publisher Sciyo
Published online 18, August, 2010
Published in print edition August, 2010
The contributions in this book present an overview of cutting edge research on natural gas which is a vital
component of world's supply of energy. Natural gas is a combustible mixture of hydrocarbon gases, primarily
methane but also heavier gaseous hydrocarbons such as ethane, propane and butane. Unlike other fossil
fuels, natural gas is clean burning and emits lower levels of potentially harmful by-products into the air.
Therefore, it is considered as one of the cleanest, safest, and most useful of all energy sources applied in
variety of residential, commercial and industrial fields. The book is organized in 25 chapters that cover various
aspects of natural gas research: technology, applications, forecasting, numerical simulations, transport and
risk assessment.
How to reference
In order to correctly reference this scholarly work, feel free to copy and paste the following:
Geir Ersland (2010). Natural Gas Hydrates, Natural Gas, Primož PotoÄÂnik (Ed.), ISBN: 978-953-307-
112-1, InTech, Available from: http://www.intechopen.com/books/natural-gas/natural-gas-hydrates