• Journal of the Korean Society of Mineral and Energy Resources Engineers
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• v.55 no.6
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• pp.670-687
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• 2018

This paper reviews the structures, physical and chemical properties, origins and global distribution, amount of energy resources, production technologies, and environmental impacts of gas hydrates to understand the gas hydrates as future energy sources. Hydrate structures should be studied to clarify the fundamentals of natural gas hydrates, hydrate distributions, and amount of energy sources in hydrates. Phase equilibria, dissociation enthalpy, thermal conductivity, specific heat, thermal diffusivity, and fluid permeability of gas hydrate systems are important parameters for the the efficient recovery of natural gas from hydrate reservoirs. Depressurization, thermal stimulation, inhibitor injection, and chemical exchange methods can be considered as future technologies to recover the energy sources from natural gas hydrates, but so far depressurization is the only method to have been applied in test productions of both onshore and offshore hydrates. Finally, we discuss the hypotheses of environmental impacts of gas hydrates and their contribution to global warming due to hydrate dissociation.

• Geophysics and Geophysical Exploration
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.216-230
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• 2014

Based on the interpretation of 3D seismic profiles acquired in the northwestern area of the Ulleung Basin, East Sea, the shallow sediments consist of five seismic units separated by regional reflectors. An anticline is present in the study area that documents activity of many faults. Bottom simulating reflectors are characterized by high RMS amplitude. Acoustic blanking with low RMS amplitude is distinctively recognized in the gas hydrate stability zone. Seismic attribute analysis shows that if gas hydrates are underlain by free gas, the high reflection strength and the low instantaneous frequency are displayed below the boundary between them. Whereas, if not, the reflection strength is low and instantaneous frequency is high continuously below the gas hydrate zone. Based on the spectral decomposition of the bottom simulating reflector, the high envelope at the specific high frequency range indicates the generation of the tuning effect due to the lower free gas content. Four models for the occurrence of the gas hydrate are suggested considering the slope of sedimentary layers as well as the presence of gas hydrate or free gas.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2007.06a
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• pp.493-496
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• 2007

Korean Institute of Geosciences and Mineral Resources (KIGAM) has studied on gas hydrate in the Ulleung Basin, East sea of Korea since 1997. Most of all, a evidence for existence of gas hydrate, possible new energy resources, in seismic reflection data is bottom simulating reflection (BSR) which parallel to the sea bottom. Here we conducted the conventional data processing for gas hydrate data and Kirchhoff prestack depth migration. Kirchhoff migration is widely used for pre- and post-stack migration might be helpful to better image as well as to get the geological information. The processed stack image by GEOBIT showed some geological structures such as faults and shallow gas hydrate seeping area indicated by strong BSR. The BSR in the stack image showed at TWT 3.07s between shot gather No 3940 to No 4120. The estimated gas seeping area occurred at the shot point No 4187 to No 4203 and it seems to have some minor faults at shot point No 3735, 3791, 3947 and 4120. According to the result of depth migration, the BSR showed as 2.3km below the sea bottom.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.39 no.6 s.181
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• pp.711-717
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• 2006

In order to study gas hydrate, potential future energy resources, Korea Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources has conducted seismic reflection survey in the East Sea since 1997. one of evidence for presence of gas hydrate in seismic reflection data is a bottom simulating reflector (BSR). The BSR occurs at the interface between overlaying higher velocity, hydrate-bearing sediment and underlying lower velocity, free gas-bearing sediment. That is often characterized by large reflection coefficient and reflection polarity reverse to that of seafloor reflection. In order to apply depth migration to seismic reflection data. we need high performance computers and a parallelizing technique because of huge data volume and computation. Phase shift plus interpolation (PSPI) is a useful method for migration due to less computing time and computational efficiency. PSPI is intrinsically parallelizing characteristic in the frequency domain. We conducted conventional data processing for the gas hydrate data of the Ease Sea and then applied prestack depth migration using message-passing-interface PSPI (MPI_PSPI) that was parallelized by MPI local-area-multi-computer (MPI_LAM). Velocity model was made using the stack velocities after we had picked horizons on the stack image with in-house processing tool, Geobit. We could find the BSRs on the migrated stack section were about at SP 3555-4162 and two way travel time around 2,950 ms in time domain. In depth domain such BSRs appear at 6-17 km distance and 2.1 km depth from the seafloor. Since energy concentrated subsurface was well imaged we have to choose acquisition parameters suited for transmitting seismic energy to target area.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.143-154
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• 2014

In this study, we simulated both dissociation of gas hydrate and mechanical deformation of hydrate-bearing sedimentary formation using geomechanical model. The geomechanical model analysis consists of two distinct codes of TOUGH+Hydrate and FLAC3D. The model is characterized by the fact that changes of temperature, pressure, saturation and their influence on the consequent evolution of effective stress, stiffness and strength of hydrate-bearing sediments during gas production could be well simulated. We compared the results of simulation for two different production methods, and showed that combination of depressurization and thermal stimulation results in the enhancement of production rate especially at early stage. We also presented that the hydrate dissociation-induced geomechanical deformation in unconsolidated clay is much larger than that in sandstone.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Building Construction Conference
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• 2022.04a
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• pp.166-167
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• 2022

The International Energy Agency(IEA) recommends that intergovernmental agreements reduce CO2 emissions by 2050 to about 50% in 2005 in its report. To realize these demands, it is suggested to actively utilize energy efficiency improvement technology, renewable energy, nuclear power, carbon dioxide capture & storage technology (CCS). In the field of building materials and cement, mineral carbonization technology is widely used. Inorganic by-products applicable to greenhouse gas storage include waste concrete, slag, coal ash, and gypsum. If the Mineral Carbonation Act is used, it is expected that about 12 million tons of greenhouse gases can be immobilized every year. Greenhouse gas immobilization using cement hydrate can be immobilized by injecting carbon dioxide into the hydrated products C-S-H, and Ca(OH)2. In the case of immobilization through concrete carbonization, a carbon dioxide promotion test is used, which is often different from the actual carbon dioxide carbonization reaction. If the external carbon dioxide concentration is abnormally higher than the reality, it is thought that it will be different from the actual reaction. In this study, the carbonation phenomenon according to the concentration and identification of the carbon dioxide reaction mechanism of cement hydrate was to be considered.

• Resources Recycling
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• v.16 no.1 s.75
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• pp.37-43
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• 2007

It was studied to prepare anhydrous magnesium chloride which could used as the raw material of a fused salt electrolysis of magnesium by dehydration of magnesium chloride hydrate. The dehydration was carried out in a tube furnace at $350{\sim}580^{\circ}C$. It was confirmed that magnesium chloride hydrate was oxdized to magnesia through the dehydration in ambient atmosphere, but anhydrous magnesium chloride could be obtained in hydrogen chloride gas atmosphere. And the crystallity of the product increased with increasing temperature and time of dehydration. All of the un-reacted hydrogen chloride gases which were generated during the dehydration in hydrogen chloride gas atmosphere could be recovered as hydrochloric solution, and it could be reused for chlorination of magnesia to prepare magnesium chloride hydrate.

• Geophysics and Geophysical Exploration
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.139-147
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• 2006

We had conducted a numerical modeling to investigate seismic properties of gas hydrate with field parameters acquired over the East sea in 1998. We used a 2-D staggered grid finite difference method to generate synthetic elastic seismograms for multi-channel seismic survey, OBC (Ocean Bottom Cable) survey and VCS (Vertical Cable Seismic) survey. The results of this study showed that the method using staggered grid yielded stable results and could be used to seismic imaging. We could find out the high amplitude anomaly and the phase reversal phenomenon of reflection wave at interface between the gas hydrate layer and free gas layer such a BSR (Bottom Simulating Reflector) which is the evidence for existence of gas hydrate in seismic reflection data. And we computed the reflection coefficients at the incident angles corresponding to offset distance with the synthetic seismograms. The reflection coefficients acquired from the numerical modeling were nearly consistent with the reflection coefficient computed by Shuey's equation.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2007.11a
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• pp.597-599
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• 2007

Studies on the hydrocarbons in shallow sediments of the East Sea of Korea have been carried out by the Korea Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources (KIGAM) since 2000. 4946 L-km of 2D multichannel reflection seismic data, 3250 L-km of high-resolution Chirp profiles and 16 selected piston cores were analyzed to determine the presence of hydrocarbons in shallow sediments of the western deep-water Ulleung Basin. The seismic data show a number of blanking zones that probably reflect widespread fluid and gas venting. The blanking zones are often associated with velocity pull-up structures. These upwelling structures are interpreted to be the result of high-velocity natural gas hydrate. There are also several bottom-simulating reflectors that are associated with free gas and probably overlying gas hydrate. Numerous pockmarks were also observed in the Chirp profiles. They are seafloor depressions caused by the removal of near-seafloor soft sediments by escaping of fluid and gas. In piston cores, cracks generally oriented parallel to bedding suggest significant gas content some of which may have been contained in gas hydrate in situ.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.24 no.5
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• pp.56-64
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• 2020

This study presents the hydrate induction time of PVCap according to subcooling temperature, salt concentration, and MEG concentration in order to analyze the inhibition effect of PVCap in various production environments of offshore gas fields. A high-pressure hydrate generator was made for the hydrate formation experiments. It was verified that the apparatus had sufficient reliability by comparing the results of hydrate equilibrium conditions and induction time from the apparatus with published reference data. As the subcooling temperature increased from 6.1℃ to 12.1℃, the induction time of PVCap concentration of 0.1~1 wt% decreased. When the salt concentration increased from 3 wt% to 7 wt%, the induction time was reduced by up to 78% under the condition of 0.5 wt% PVCap due to polymer structure degradation by salt effect. In the case of HHI (hybrid hydrate inhibitor) made by mixing MEG 10 wt% and PVCap, the change in induction time was not large compared to PVCap 1 wt% due to the under-inhibition effect. On the other hand, the hydrate inhibition efficiency of HHI with MEG 20wt% increased 1.7 times compared to PVCap.