Industrial Applications of Gas Hydrate

Gas hydrates have several features that make them attractive for industrial purposes. First, they separate materials when they form. Examples of this include fresh water from seawater desalination, decontamination, and gas purification. Second, they are easy to generate solids that can be used to store industrial gases. This is significant for energy storage, where safer gas hydrate tankers may compete with LNG tankers, chemical storage, where chlorine can be transported as a solid rather than liquid, and sub-seafloor carbon dioxide sequestration. Third, hydrates form and dissociate reversibly, exchanging a large amount of heat at the same time. This is an ideal feature for refrigerants.

Gas hydrates can also have a negative impact on industry such as when they block oil and gas pipelines.

Compound hydrates, such as natural gas hydrate, can have complex
interactions with the surroundings/environment that change the conditions at which formation and dissociation occur. Understanding the interaction of these materials with their surroundings is critical for control of industrial processes and for the description of natural hydrate systems.

Click here to view and download the Impact of Compound Hydrate Phase Parameters on Formation/Dissociation poster by J. P. Osegovic and M. D. Max, made for the 2006 AGU Fall Meeting, MR43A-1064.