Abstract

Gas hydrates were first described by Sir Humphrey Davy in 1811. These solid ice-like compounds have been known as a laboratory curiosity, and as a process engineering problem, for a long time. Gas hydrate formation requires a narrow set of temperature and pressures. They have been recognized by drilling onshore in Arctic areas, and by drilling, seismic studies, and by direct observations in deep ocean sediments. A mid-range estimate of gas hydrate abundance would suggest 10,000 TCF of methane potentially available in the deep ocean environment. Exploration drilling to investigate gas hydrates is being carried out (or planned) in the Gulf of Mexico, McKenzie Delta, Prudhoe Bay, Japan and India. To influence world energy supplies, technology needs to unlock the biogenic gas hydrate accumulations in deep water, such as the Blake Plateau, off the East Coast of the United States, where enormous quantities of methane hydrate have been inferred. If the problems with producing methane commercially from gas hydrates were solved, the world could transition from the hydrocarbon age to the hydrogen age.

Presented at: 2005 South East Asia Petroleum Exploration Society (SEAPEX) Conference, Singapore, 2005