Canadian-Japanese Team Digs Frozen Gas Hydrates In Arctic
YellowKnife, Northwest Territories, Canada (AHN) – A joint Canadian and Japanese team will announce this week details of their frozen gas hydrates discovery in the Arctic region. Gas hydrates looms as a new energy source, produced using conventional techniques.
The team invested $48 million on the venture, which had researchers drilling over two winters over a kilometer into a 150-meter thick layer on the edge of the Beaufort Sea at Mallik. The area has the most known concentrated deposit of frozen fuel in the world.
Previous drilling attempts produced gas from hydrates for only a few hours, but the Mallik drilling provided steady and sustained flow for six days.
Hydrates build up in large quantities under oceans and permafrost. The pressure traps gas in small cages or crystals made of water molecules, which when brought to the surface the cages melt and release methane gas that burns when lit with a match and generate a fiery ice.
It produces 40 percent less carbon dioxide than oil or coal when burned.
About 300 scientists and engineers are involved in the Mallik 2002 Gas Hydrate Production Research Program. The lead agency behind the program is Natural Resources Canada. Other agencies participating in the venture are the Japan National Oil Corporation, GeoForschungsZentrum Potsdam, the U.S. Department of Energy, the India Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas-Gas Authority of India and the BP-Chevron Texaco Mackenzie Delta Joint Venture.
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