Fire from ice: Progress to date

Abstract

An international symposium in Japan has examined the current state of development of methane hydrate resources ranging from Mallik to the Nankai Trough. Offshore engineers generally run into hydrates in the context of flow assurance, because they can bung up pipelines and subsea systems. Mallik is an onshore hydrate field in the Mackenzie Delta, 100km north of Inuvik. The hydrate zones are at 900-1110m depth, underlying about 600m of permafrost. Several groups have developed numerical models to examine the complex coupled thermal and geotechnical changes that accompany dissociation. Hydrates reservoirs are very different from traditional gas reservoirs. Offshore production of gas from hydrates is not going to happen in 2011 or next year. The general opinion is that serious production will begin in one or two decades, depending in part on what happens to the gas price.