Analytical modeling of gas recovery from in situ hydrates dissociation

Exploration activities around the world have confirmed that in situ hydrate s are widely available in permafrost and oceanic sediments. These hydrocarb on deposits have stimulated worldwide efforts to understand gas production from hydrate dissociation in a porous media. This work is a contribution to wards these efforts. The present study uses depressurization-driven in situ hydrate dissociation, incorporates decomposition kinetics into the radial diffusivity equation, and develops a model to predict the performance of na turally occurring hydrates. The proposed model is simple yet useful and it does not require any empirical correlation. The model-predicted performance compares well with the published experimental studies on the hydrate disso ciation in porous media. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved .