2013 Long Enough Spoon Award - DOE Grants To Researchers On How To Capture Methane Hydrates

[hatrack]

Tool monkeys! Fuck yeah!!

WASHINGTON — The Energy Department on Wednesday announced it is giving seven institutions — including two Texas universities — nearly $5 million in grants to continue research on how to unlock methane gas trapped in ice-like crystals under the sea floor and the Arctic permafrost.

The move underscores the Obama administration’s continued commitment to investigating the potential energy resources locked in methane hydrates, despite concerns that unchecked methane releases could accelerate global warming.

It could take decades for the projects to be commercialized. There may be little need to develop new natural gas resources now, while the U.S. is awash in methane from onshore resources extracted through existing techniques. But supporters say research now could lead to commercial extraction and production techniques years down the line, enabling the resource to be tapped if and when it is needed.

The University of Texas at Austin nabbed the biggest single award, of $1.7 million, to use 3-D modeling to examine the forces that are causing massive methane hydrate accumulations deep below the seabed. The research could help identify how much free gas they contain and where they are located.

EDIT

http://fuelfix.com/blog/2013/11/20/texas-researchers-win-federal-grants-to-study-methane-hydrates/

[GliderGuider]

1. Right on schedule!!!

[CRH]

2. And how much did they invest in carbon capture technology? ...

Last edited Thu Nov 21, 2013, 11:52 AM - Edit history (1)

Still trying to find ways to fully harvest hydrocarbons, but not investigating to capture the planet heating exhaust, CO2.

Good thing this is the Obama administration, imagine if a former Texas governor was president.

[pscot]

3. It's a beautiful morning

Cold, but clear. We've had a great sunrise. The Sound is a deep blue and the haze on the hills across the water has a pink glow; spectacular, really. A half dozen pigeons are hanging out in the top of a bright yellow birch tree, silhouetted against the sky. It's enough to break your heart.

[GliderGuider]

4. Nice! Thanks for the reminder.

[Nihil]

5. OK, I give up.

Why is that familiar?

[pscot]

7. Because it's all around you?

Life isn't as complicated as we make it out to be.

[Nihil]

8. Excellent point.

Sometimes the forest gets hidden by all of the nearby trees.

[kristopher]

6. I'd like to know more about these research projects

One of the big question marks in our understanding of warming's feedbacks involves knowledge of what precise conditions trigger release of these structures. While these research projects might be strictly related to "recovery" of the methane for fuel, it seems likely to me that they could be aimed at gathering the information required to improve our modeling of the pathways and consequences of AGW.