In November 2012, there was a conference on hydrates:
http://www.bulletins-electroniques.com/ ... /71440.htm
At the international conference Falling Walls held on November 9, 2012 in Berlin, Professor Peter Herzig drew public attention to the hidden resources of the seabed. Mr. Herzig is a graduate in geology and director of GEOMAR (Helmholtz Center for Ocean Research in Kiel, Schleswig-Holstein), the German institute equivalent to the French IFREMER. He who often linked marine sciences and economics, wanted to make the public aware of the still poorly understood potential of the seabed in terms of exploitation of natural resources. In fact, these geographic zones contain bacteria as well whose bioactive substances could be useful for the pharmaceutical industry as mineral resources such as gold, and especially energy resources like hydrates of methane.
Definition
A methane hydrate (or methane clathrate) is a compound of organic origin naturally present in the seabed, as well as in the permafrost (ground frozen for at least two consecutive years) of the polar regions. Colloquially referred to as "burning ice", this crystallized compound is flammable. At the molecular level, a methane clathrate is in fact made up of a fine crystal "cage" in which gas is trapped from the decomposition of organic matter relatively recent compared to that generating oil and natural gas.
Resources
Methane clathrates are present in large quantities on the seabed at depths of a few hundred meters. The estimated quantity would be close to 200 billion m3 of gas, i.e. 150 to 700 years of operation. The amount of methane hydrates in the continental reservoir is less well known. The relatively small surface (10 million km2) occupied by the permafrost suggests that it is less than in the oceanic reservoir.
Exploitation
The reserves of methane hydrates are therefore considerable and many oil companies are interested in it. However, the recovery of this compound is difficult and costly (decompression, use of solvent such as methanol, heating, etc.) and the technological difficulties which result therefrom currently seem far from being resolved. In addition, geophysical risks such as landslides are added to operational difficulties. For comparison, the exploitation of shale gas is less complex and cheaper.
Climate consequences
The exploitation of methane hydrates could pose serious problems with regard to the greenhouse effect. Their combustion emits CO2, in addition to the risk that large quantities of methane enter the atmosphere during their exploitation, knowing that the global warming potential of methane is 22 times greater than that of carbon dioxide. However, mining could also be used to sequester carbon, trapping CO2 in crystals to form hydrates of CO2 which would maintain geological stability in the deposits.
International and German politics
The Japanese were the first to launch a research program aimed at determining the energy resources of the country's seabed. The quantity of this resource in the sea around Japan is equivalent to 100 years of national consumption of natural gas. Industrialists have to test hydrate decompression methods at sea, making it possible to fully recover it, this is one of the Japanese JOGMEC's projects.
The German SUGAR project (research and underwater transport of gas hydrates, [1]), launched in the summer of 2008 by the Leibniz Institute for Marine Sciences in Kiel (Schleswig-Holstein), under the supervision of the Federal Ministries of economy and technology (BMWi) and education and research (BMBF) with the support of 30 economic and scientific partners and an initial budget of almost 13 million euros, aims to extract methane marine and to store in its place CO2 captured at the outlet of thermal power plants or other industrial installations.
Germany does not have zones rich in methane hydrates, but it is very interested in developing technologies for exploiting this resource and then associating with countries such as India, Taiwan or South Korea; this is to help them extract the resource optimally and sequester part of the industrial carbon.
Conclusion
The exploitation of these methane hydrates is of a certain complexity, even crippling. However, given the interest of oil companies, based on the growing need of nations for carbon energy, it seems that this resource could be partially exploited in the coming decades. France has significant ocean research equipment and significant expertise in the field (IFREMER) which could be used in the framework of Franco-German projects on the exploitation of methane hydrates.
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[1] Submarine Gashydrat-Lagerstätten: Erkundung, Abbau und Transport