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Future Supply and Emerging Resources
The National Methane Hydrates R&D Program

Over the past five years, unprecedented progress has been made in methane hydrate R&D. Research enabled by the Methane Hydrate Research and Development Act of 2000 and the subsequent 2005 amendment to this Act [PDF-28KB], has resulted in significant advances in understanding of methane hydrates, their role in nature, and their potential as a future energy resource. This success is largely due to an unprecedented level of cooperation between federal agencies, industry, labs, and academia. Read More.

Announcements

Well log Data From BP-DOE-US "Mount Elbert" Test Available Digital well log data acquired at the February 2007 gas hydrates test well at Milne Point, Alaska are now available. Data include Gamma ray, neutron porosity, density porosity, three-dimensional high resolution resistivity, acoustics including compressional- and shear-wave data and nuclear magnetic resonance. A listing of the available data, as well as instructions on obtaining the data, can be found on the NETL gas hydrates website .

The Spring 2008 edition of Fire in the Ice is now available. In this edition read about the release of preliminary results from an MMS assessment of GOM in-place natural gas hydrate, the Korean National Program expedition, Mt. Elbert test data, a marine hydrates model, and other announcements. The "Spotlight on Research" features Marta Torres of Oregon State University.

DOE-NETL Methane Hydrate Program Releases Research Funding Opportunity   The Department of Energy (DOE), National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) released a funding opportunity announcement (FOA) on January 30, 2008 focused on soliciting research that will support ongoing efforts to determine the potential of methane hydrates as a future energy source. The funding opportunity seeks proposals that will: 1) evaluate opportunities for production testing in Alaska; 2) develop production systems for high-saturation subsurface sandstone reservoirs; and 3) develop new tools for detecting and characterizing hydrates via remote sensing applications, particularly deep marine electro-magnetics (EM), in association with new or ongoing field projects. DOE is also anticipating an additional request for projects probing the links between gas hydrates and global climate/global carbon cycling at a later date. For further information regarding the FOA, please visit the DOE-NETL business / solicitation website .

Call for Papers: Gas Hydrates Symposium at the American Chemical Society 2009 National Meeting
The 237th American Chemical Society National Meeting, to be held March 22-26, 2009 in Salt Lake City, Utah, will feature a Gas Hydrates Symposium with several sessions on natural gas hydrates. These include: gas hydrates in energy production, recovery and assessment; industrial applications of gas hydrates (flow assurance, energy storage and separation processes); and fundamental studies of gas hydrates (thermodynamics, kinetics). If you are interested in presenting a paper, contact symposium chairs Carolyn Koh or Dendy Sloan at the Colorado School of Mines Center for Hydrate Research (ckoh@mines.edu or esloan@mines.edu) before March 1, 2008.

Third Recipient of a Methane Hydrate Research Fellowship Selected - Dr. Laura Lapham, a post-doctoral researcher at Florida State University, has been selected as the third recipient of a Methane Hydrate Research Fellowship. Dr. Lapham will investigate the factors that control hydrate stability in order to better understand why observed dissolution rates in the field are often much slower than theoretical predictions. More on the academic research fellowship program.

Report to Congress on Methane Hydrates Research now available [PDF-external site]. This report from the Federal Methane Hydrate Advisory Committee provides an assessment of the Methane Hydrate Research Program as well as an assessment of the 5-year research plan of the Department of Energy.

NETL Researchers Pursue Gas Hydrates Across the Globe Over the past 18 months, NETL researchers have pursued natural gas hydrates from India to Korea, from the Equator to the Arctic Circle.

The Interagency Roadmap for Methane Hydrate R&D (PDF), which outlines a plan of action to fully address the goals of the Methane Hydrate Research and Development Act, is now available.

Announcement Archive >

Key LInks

In addition to the work carried out by individual researchers, the Program supports this website, the Fire in the Ice (FITI) newsletter which serves to highlight ongoing activities and advancements in the methane hydrates community, and a wide array of meetings and workshops that facilitate the broad and timely dissemination of research progress and results to the larger gas hydrate and natural gas research community and the Nation.

Today, the National Methane Hydrate R&D Program, which is managed by DOE through FE and the National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL), is well established. The planned research, framed through discussions among the six participating federal agencies and in consultation with advisory panels from industry and academia, is directed towards achieving the following seven objectives which were outlined in the Methane Hydrate Advisory Committee's December 2002 Report to Congress:

  • A better characterization of the chemical and physical properties of hydrates,
  • The development of technology needed to achieve a more complete survey of hydrate distribution,
  • An improved understanding of how to mitigate the hazards that hydrates pose to ongoing deep-water oil and gas drilling and production,
  • An improved understanding of how hydrates interact with the natural environment, including any links to issues of seafloor stability and global climate,
  • An improved understanding of biological communities dependent upon hydrate occurrences and how to protect them,
  • The development of improved tools for studying hydrates in both the lab and the field, and
  • An appraisal of technologies for the safe and commercial production of methane from hydrates and industry resources to enable cost-efficient R&D in the field.
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