GOLDEN, Colo., May 30, 2012 – A Colorado School of Mines research project focused on reducing the risk of environmental and operational safety problems associated with hydrate blockages forming in offshore natural gas and oil pipelines is among thirteen projects selected by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) for further development.
All projects chosen for development are focused on reducing risk while enhancing environmental performance of drilling and production for natural gas and oil in ultra-deepwater settings. The Research Partnership to Secure Energy for America will administer the research contracts under the management of the Office of Fossil Energy’s National Energy Technology Laboratory.
The DOE funding for the two-year Mines project is $701,733. Total project cost is $877,267. The DOE is awarding $35.4 million across the 13 projects.
Mines’ Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering researchers Carolyn Koh, Amadeu Sum and Dendy Sloan, will work with Michael Volk and Emmanual Dellacase from the University of Tulsa on “Hydrate Modeling and Flow Loop Experiments for Water Continuous and Dispersed Systems.”
The Mines-Tulsa project aims to:
- Verify and improve a hydrate slurry viscosity model,
- Perform flowloop experiments to investigate the characteristics of gas hydrate formation under flow to optimize the hydrate slurry model and growth parameters,
- Incorporate the hydrate slurry viscosity model in the Colorado School of Mines’ hydrate growth rate model,
- Predict and validate an improved hydrate kinetic model using flow loop experiments,
- Model development for water+gas and water+gas+oil systems.
For more information, see the DOE website.
Contact:
Karen Gilbert, Director of Public Relations / 303-273-3541 / KGilbert@mines.edu
David Tauchen, Public Relations Specialist / 303-273-3088 / DTauchen@mines.edu