In a discovery that is sure to garner quite a bit of attention from policy-makers and economists alike, Japan has become the first country to successfully extract natural gas from frozen methane hydrate.
This represents an exciting development in the race for alternative energy sources. Several countries, including the U.S. and Canada, have been investigating ways to extract natural gas from methane hydrates (known as clathrates), and now it appears there is a verifiable method for doing so.
"It is the world's first offshore experiment producing gas from methane hydrate," says an official from the economy, trade and industry ministry.
The clathrates are a sort of frozen cage of methane and water found in offshore deposits. This particular deposit was mined in a gas field about 50 km off of Japan's main island, in what is known as the Nankai Trough.
These offshore deposits could be a potentially huge source of alternative energy, but as is so often the case when it comes to energy harvesting, there are environmental concerns to consider. The underwater geology that sustains them is unstable in many places, and it is unknown what kind of effect a mass extraction of this natural gas would have on its surrounding ecosystem.
Using a depressurization method that turns methane hydrate into methane gas, Japanese engineers were able to do what nobody else has been able to. Production tests will run for the next two weeks, but barring any unforeseen issues, the future looks promising for this new energy source.
A Japanese study has estimated that there is around 1.1 trillion cubic meters of methane hydrate deposits existing offshore. If Japan could be able to mine all of that, the resulting gain in energy would be enough to sustain their country for ten year. This is an especially reassuring victory for Japan, who has few domestic sources of energy and has had to largely rely on other nations for energy support.
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