GAS HYDRATES: THE TITAN UNCONVENTIONAL RESOURCE

An H2O crystal lattice structure consisting of tons and tons of methane gas. Capable of expanding up to 150 times its original size. Now that is some huge amount of storage if one starts to consider it seems almost unreal. Well, this enormous source of gas exists and is known by the name of gas hydrate.

Gas hydrate is a part of the unconventional resources of hydrocarbons and is one which has the most extensive amount of capacity of storing carbon content of about 2.2 million pounds that is twice the amount of any other conventional and unconventional fossil fuel in existence.

Throughout the world the ratio of gas hydrates in comparison to other fossil fuels (conventional and unconventional) is 2:1 respectively hence making it the largest source of hydrocarbons.

Mostly occurring in permafrost regions and deep within the ocean floor, however due to greenhouse gas emissions/global warming these clathrates recently have been found near land and have been captured in nets yes fishing nets.

So now we know a little about what gas hydrates are, their potential and where they occur. But what is the world doing about it.

Well, countries like China, Japan, Korea, and India with hydrate resources, research and development programs are doing the extensive job on determining and producing these titans of energy. Comparing the progress between these countries Japan has been the most successful, recently producing the offshore methane hydrates in a testing phase in 2013.A more promising future next to this achievement can be seen from India having the largest research and development field work being conducted there internationally inviting all the research facilities/institutions and O&G companies to come work on finding out and maximizing the potential to gain from the hydrate resource.

Other countries are also working on gaining an edge over one another in obtaining fruitful results from gas hydrates.

Places like the Gulf of Mexico, Alaska, and Malaysia are being been focused on. Recently Canada had to drop out of this race due to the shortage of funds. However, USA and UK haven’t ignored the hydrate potential being one of the chief research-based countries which are figuring out methods of finding and producing hydrates. UK’s Heriot-Watt University is the leading institute for gas hydrates research. USA's Rice University, Texas A&M University and Colorado School of Mines doing a tremendous job in development and research of gas hydrates.

The question is where Pakistan stands in all this. The answer to that is a bit vague. Pakistan has a lot of potential in terms of gas hydrates positioning. 

A rough estimate about the extent of gas hydrates field offshore is 200km long, 100 km wide, 600 meters thick.

Now keeping in mind that 1 cubic meter of hydrate consists of 164 cubic meters of gas the amount of reserves that we have is ginormous.

There hasn't been much work done as the word 'roughly' mentioned above indicates, we need to do a lot of work starting from estimating the exact potential and hotspots to research work. 

The prospects are highly encouraging; the amount of gas produced from the hydrates can power our nation for decades to come. We are missing out on the verge of a revolutionizing era which is to come for the oil and gas industry in the near future and need to pace up to produce as much as possible from this beacon of auspiciousness.



GAS HYDRATES: THE TITAN UNCONVENTIONAL RESOURCE

Mohsin Yousufi, Lecturer, NED University of Engineering and Technology, Karachi