Getting to grips with hydrate gas seeps
Article by John Bradbury
Published in ChemWeek on September 1, 2003
A new high tech sensor is being developed to try and take some of the uncertainty out of the hazards posed to offshore structures by methane gas hydrate seeps.
The development of a new type of gas sniffer and analyzer is underway for use on the deep ocean floor in the US Gulf of Mexico. It is being developed under a research program, which brings together a commercial company, academics and an oceanographic institution. They are collaborating to turn the new gas-sensing tool into reality by relying on proven optical spectrometer technology.
Their new gas tool uses the principles of absorption; emission or scattering of electromagnetic radiation at various wavelengths by atoms and molecules to qualitatively and quantitatively study a substance.
The research and development program could have a two-fold benefit. First, it could be instrumental in helping to more accurately detect oil and gas resources by pinpointing precisely the source of gas seeps on the ocean floor. Secondly, there could an environmental benefit too, by helping to identify if gas seeps influence global climate change.
Unexplored gas seeps occur worldwide, according to Dr. Jean Whelan at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute (WHOI) in Woods Hole, Cape Cod, Mass.
“Any methane injected directly from the ocean to the atmosphere could be a significant player in global climate change.” But she added, “Seeps sometimes are indicative of underlying major oil and gas reservoirs.”
WHOI, which claims to be the largest independently funded oceanographic institute in the world, is collaborating with WellDog and Canada’s University of Victoria to develop the gas sensor.
Technology provided by WellDog, which was founded in 1999 to commercialize optical spectroscopy for oil and gas applications, will provide the basis for the R&D program, after it developed the first optical spectrometer for use on manned submersible vehicles, called the SeaDog, in August 2000.
The three institutions will be using a recently awarded US $215,787 grant from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Underwater Research Program to work on providing the new gas tool led by Whelan at WHOI.
WellDog’s president, Dr. John Pope, said, “This grant will finally allow us to realize our vision of building an instrument capable of rapid detection of natural gas and other chemicals in the deep ocean. Using this instrument, we’ll be able to locate oil and gas in the sea floor, to indicate areas of gas hydrate activity, and to work with other researchers to study the complex geochemistry of the surrounding ocean waters.”
Also on the team is professor Michael Whiticar at the University of Victoria. The mission is to perfect a tool capable of providing long-term geochemical data as part of a bigger sea monitoring station project, managed by the Gulf of Mexico Hydrate Research Consortium established in 1997 with a $45 million budget.
All of this is within the context of broader national research program into the hazards posed to oil and gas operations by methane seeps.
Dr. J. Robert Woolsey, director of the University of Mississippi in a May 25, 1999 statement to the US House of Representatives Resources committee, made a plea for more funding to the tune of $10 million a year for the continental shelf division of the Center for Marine Resources and Environmental Technology (CMRET) within the University of Mississippi. His statement outlined how important hydrates research was to the offshore industry: “Members of a panel of experts at a deepwater workshop organized by the Society of Exploration Geophysicists in New Orleans last fall [1998] unanimously declared that shallow water flows (SWFs) presented the greatest obstacle to deep water drilling worldwide.”
For more information, visit www.welldog.com or www.whoi.edu.
