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The study of formation and dissociation of CO2 hydrate in porous media was characterized by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) system in in situ conditions. This work simulated porous media by using glass beads of uniform size. The growth and dissociation habit of CO2 hydrate was observed under different temperature and pressure conditions. The induction time and the hydrate saturation during the growth and dissociation process in different sizes of porous media were obtained by using the MRI signal intensity. The results indicate that hydrate growth rate and the induction time are affected by the size of porous media, pressure, and degree of supercooling. There are three hydrate growth stages, i.e., initial growth stage, rapid growth stage and steady stage. In this study, the CO2 hydrate forms preferentially at the surface of vessel and then gradually grows inward. The hydrate tends to cement the glass beads together and occupies the pore gradually. As the hydrate decomposes gradually, the dissociation rate increases to the maximum and then decreases to zero.

Gas hydrate decomposition in sediments involves complicated multiphase flow and heat and mass transfer processes because of heat absorption by solid hydrates. Factors affecting gas hydrate decomposition in sediments include sediment type, mineral composition, pore size distribution, particle size, pore water composition, hydrate saturation distribution, initial formation pressure and temperature and cement characteristics. In this paper, experimental simulations of gas hydrate decomposition are carried out on an artificial core to investigate the effects of initial pressure and temperature, particle size and pore size. The experiments show that the characteristics of gas hydrate decomposition in sediments differ completely from those in a pure water system. The decomposition rate of hydrate sediments increases with the initial pressure increasing and decreasing temperatures. Furthermore, the decomposition rate of hydrate sediments decreases with decreasing particle size and increasing pore size.

The influences of halogen ions extracted from sodium fluoride, sodium chloride, sodium bromide, and sodium iodide and their concentrations on methane hydrate phase equilibrium conditions in porous media were investigated experimentally using an orthogonal test method at a pressure of 8 MPa. The experimental results showed that the equilibrium temperature of methane hydrate decreased when halogen ions were added. The equilibrium temperature decreased with the increase of halogen ion concentrations. The influence of the sources of the halogens ion to the methane hydrate equilibrium temperature were insensitive according to variance analysis, which could be explained by about the same mean ionic activity coefficient (a dimensionless coefficient relates the activity to a measured concentration) of sodium fluoride, sodium chloride, sodium bromide, and sodium iodide. The experimental measurements were also in close agreement with the thermodynamic model of Song et al. (J. Nat. Gas Chem. 19, 241 (2010)), in which the mechanical equilibrium of force between the interfaces in a hydrate–liquid–vapor system was considered.

The decomposition process of gas hydrate in sediments is actually the dynamic phase transition process of solid hydrate in sediments after absorbing heat decomposition. According to the phase equilibrium characteristics of gas hydrate, there are three basic development methods, including heating, chemical injecting and depressurization. Currently, there is no good commercial software used to simulate heat transmission and mass transfer in the gas hydrate decomposition process. So in this paper, based on typical gas hydrate sediment in South China Sea, microcosmic, mesocosmic (fractal theory) and macrocosmic scales are respectively used to successfully reveal the heat and mass transfer mechanism of three basis development methods. Molecular dynamics simulation shows heat injection is the best method for heat and mass transferring, and chemical injecting is better than depressurization. Fractal theory is successfully used to describe the complex structure of the porous sediments with gas hydrate occurrence, and can realize the prediction of heat and mass transfer law of hydrate dissociation in porous media. Macrocosmic numerical simulation of depressurization for gas hydrate sediment in South China Sea shows gas hydrate reservoir geological model has a large influence on the gas hydrate decomposition, and permeability and hydrate saturation of the upper cover layer have great effect on gas hydrate decomposition. It is poor development efficiency for only depressurization development and the problem of water drainage should be paid attention during development process.Copyright © 2014 by ASME

According to the schematic and properties of a methane hydrate deposit in Shenhu Area of South China Sea in China, the characteristic of hydrate dissociation, water and gas production were simulated with a depressurization method. The effect of hydrate saturation, porosity and permeability et al. on hydrate dissociation was studied, the key controlling factor and difficulty of gas production from hydrate reservoir by depressurization was confirmed.Copyright © 2013 by ASME