Towards Commercial Gas Production from Hydrate Deposits

Over the last decade global natural gas consumption has steadily increased since many industrialized countries are substituting natural gas for coal to generate electricity. There is also significant industrialization and economic growth of the heavily populated Asian countries of India and China. The general consensus is that there are vast quantities of natural gas trapped in hydrate deposits in geological systems, and this has resulted in the emerging importance of hydrates as a potential energy resource and an accompanying proliferation of recent studies on the technical and economic feasibility of gas production from hydrates. There are then the associated environmental concerns. This study reviews the state of knowledge with respect to natural gas hydrates and outlines remaining challenges and knowledge gaps.