Depressurization and electrical heating of hydrate sediment for gas production

Abstract:

In-situ dissociation of natural gas hydrate is necessary for commercial recovery of natural gas from natural gas hydrate sediment. Thermal stimulation is an effective dissociation method, along with depressurization. In this study, we examined the efficiency of electrical heating of the hydrate core for gas production. In order to evaluate efficiency of electrical heating with depressurization, we investigated following subject. (1) electrical heating of Xe gas hydrate sediment, as a conventional simulation of methane hydrate sediment, (2) electrical heating of methane hydrate sediment, which was compared with Xe gas hydrate experiment, and (3) electrical heating of hydrate bearing sediment with fine sandy layer which was simulated faults with large displacement shear around hydrate sediment. These experiments revealed that depressurization and additional electrode heating of hydrate sediment saturated with electrolyte solution was confirmed to enable higher efficient and effective gas production from sediment
with less electric power. This study is financially supported by METI and Research Consortium for Methane Hydrate Resources in Japan (the MH21 Research Consortium).