• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.24 no.6
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• pp.18-27
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• 2020

This study presents flow assurance analysis in subsea pipeline considering system availability of topside in LNG-FPSO. A hydrate management strategy was established, which consisted of PVCap experiments, system availability analysis of LNG-FPSO topside, hydrate risk analysis in the pipeline, and calculation of PVCap injection concentration. The experimental data required for the determination of PVCap injection concentration were obtained by measuring the hydrate induction time of PVCap at the subcooling temperatures of 6.1, 9.2, and 12.1℃. The availability of LNG-FPSO topside system for 20 years was 89.3%, and the longest downtime of 50 hours occurred 2.9 times per year. The subsea pipeline model for multiphase flow simulation was created using field geometry data. As a result of risk analysis of hydrate plugging using subsea pipeline model, hydrate was formed at the end of flowline in 23.2 hours under the condition of 50 hours shutdown. The injection concentration of PVCap was determined based on the PVCap experiment results. The hydrate plugging in subsea pipeline of LNG-FPSO can be completely prevented by injecting PVCap 0.25 wt% 2.9 times per year.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.6 no.4 s.18
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• pp.8-16
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• 2002

Since hydrate has been discovered on the earth, many numbers of experimental studies have been conducted for characterizing the fundamental properties of hydrates, such as equilibrium conditions, thermodynamic properties, structures, kinetics, etc. It is considered naturally occurred hydrates in porous rocks have a great potential as a future of unconventional energy resources, and the investigations of formation and dissociation of hydrates in porous media are required. In this study, an experimental apparatus was designed to perform experiments of hydrates in porous core. With the apparatus developed, firstly, isochoric experiments were conducted to find hydrate equilibrium conditions in porous media, and the results were compared with reference data to verify experimental apparatus and methods in this study. Secondly, experiment of formation was examined by observing the behaviors of pressure and electrical resistance and the effects of initial water saturation on formation were analysed.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.44 no.3
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• pp.229-238
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• 2011

S-wave, which provides lithology and pore fluid information, plays a key role in estimating gas-hydrate saturation. In general, P- and S-wave velocities increase in the presence of gas-hydrate and the P-wave velocity decreases in the presence of free gas under the gas-hydrate layer. Whereas there are very small changes, even slightly increases, in the S-wave velocity in the free gas layer because S-wave is not affected by the pore fluid when propagating in the free gas layer. To verify those velocity properties of the BSR (bottom-simulating reflector) depth in the gas-hydrate prospect area in the Ulleung Basin, P- and S-wave velocity profiles were derived from multi-component ocean-bottom seismic data which were acquired by Korea Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources (KIGAM) in May 2009. OBS (ocean-bottom seismometer) hydrophone component data were modeled and inverted first through the traveltime inversion method to derive P-wave velocity and depth model of survey area. 2-D multichannel stacked data were incorporated as an initial model. Two horizontal geophone component data, then, were polarization filtered and rotated to make radial component section. Traveltimes of main S-wave events were picked and used for forward modeling incorporating Poisson's ratio. This modeling provides S-wave profiles and Poisson's ratio profiles at every OBS site. The results shows that P-wave velocities in most OBS sites decrease beneath the BSR, whereas S-wave velocities slightly increase. Consequently, Poisson's ratio decreased strongly beneath the BSR indicating the presence of a free gas layer under the BSR.

• Geophysics and Geophysical Exploration
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.102-115
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• 2012

The purpose of this paper is to review several different methods calculating gas hydrate saturations. There are three methods using downhole log data, core data (including pressure core), and seismic velocity data. Archie's equation using electrical resistivity of downhole log data is widely used for saturation calculation. In this case, Archie's parameters should be defined accurately. And the occurrence types of gas hydrate significantly affect to saturation calculation. Thus saturation calculation should be carefully conducted. The methods using chlorinity and pressure core data are directly calculated from core sample. So far, the saturation calculated from pressure core gives accurate and quantitative values. But this method is needed much more time and cost. Thus acquisition of the continuous data with sediment depth is realistically hard. The recent several results show that the saturation calculated from resistivity data is the highest values, while the value calculated from pressure core is the lowest. But this trend is not always absolutely. Thus, to estimate accurate gas hydrate saturation, the values calculated from several methods should be compared.

• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.47 no.1
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• pp.71-85
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• 2014

To study biogeochemical characteristics and origin organic matter, sediment samples were taken from Site of 1249C and Stie 1251B of ODP Leg 204. Data of Rock-Eval, isotope, and element analysis generally indicate dominance of marine organic matter in sediments deposited under marine sedimentary environment. Only Rock-Eval data are somewhat different from those of others owing to under-maturation of organic matter. Samples of Site 1249C show high content of gas hydrate, whereas Site 1251B low content of gas hydrate in some intervals of the core. This result may be accounted to different location of two cores and presence of transportation passage (Horizon A, BSR 2) of thermogenic gas in the core, 1249 C. However, Site 1251B Located in the basin of low accumulation of gas hydrate is presumed to be limited in the gas hydrate production. Because not only transportation passage is limited to move thermogenic gas from the core, but also gas supply was not enough. Therefore, the biogenic gas that resulted from diagenesis of there sediment is superior.

• Geophysics and Geophysical Exploration
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• v.26 no.1
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• pp.18-30
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• 2023

Submarine mud volcanos are topographic features that resemble volcanoes, and are formed due to eruptions of fluidized or gasified sediment material. They have gained attention as a source of subsurface heat, sediment, or hydrocarbons supplied to the surface. In the continental slope of the Canadian Beaufort Sea, mud volcano exists at various water depths. The MV420, is an active mud volcano erupting at a water depth of 420 meters, and it has been the subject of extensive study. The Korea Polar Research Institute(KOPRI) collected high-resolution seismic data and heat flow data around the caldera of the mud volcano. By analyzing the multi-channel seismic data, we confirmed the reverse-polarity reflector assumed by a gas hydrate-related bottom simulating reflector(BSR). To further elucidate the relationship between the BSR and gas hydrates, as well as the thermal structure of the mud volcano, a numerical geothermal model was developed based on the steady-state heat equation. Using this model, we estimated the base of the gas hydrate stability zone and found that the BSR depth estimated by multi-channel seismic data and the bottom of the gas hydrate stability zone were in good agreement., This suggests the presence of gas hydrates, and it was determined that the depth of the gas hydrate was likely up to 50 m, depending on the distance from the mud conduit. Thus, this depth estimate slightly differs from previous studies.

• Resources Recycling
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.8-12
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• 2007

Anhydrous magnesium chloride, dehydration product from magnesium chloride hydrate is a general raw material to prepare electrolytic magnesium. However, the dehydration is not trivial and can be accompanied by hydrolysis leading to the production of undesirable hydroxy chloride compounds of magnesium. Therefore, dehydration process is actually the most complicated and hardest in the electrolysis methods for the production of magnesium. In this work, the influence of dehydrating temperature has been studied at the temperature range from $200^{\circ}C$ to $600^{\circ}C$ in air and HCl gas atmosphere individually to compare the results. With increasing of dehydration temperature MgOHCl and MgO were obtained in air. On the other hand, when the temperature was increased above $300^{\circ}C$ anhydrous magnesium chlorides were prepared in HCl gas atmosphere. Anhydrous magnesium chloride was formed at near $300^{\circ}C$ and completely crystallized at about $500^{\circ}C$. All of the HCl used as atmosphere gas in the dehydration was recovered as hydrochloric acid solution at a water vessel up to 41% by weight at $20^{\circ}C$.

• Ocean and Polar Research
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.51-62
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• 2001

The Arctic consists of numerous sedimentary basins containing voluminous natural resources and two of the world's major oil and gas producing areas. The western Siberia Basin in the Arctic region has the largest petroliferous province with an area of 800 ${\times}$ 1,200 km and produces more than 60% of total Russian oil production. The North Slope of Alaska produces about 20% of the U.S. output, i.e., 11% of the total U.S. consumption. Being small compared to those regions, the Canadian Northwest Territories and the Pechora Basin in Russia produce only fair amount of oil and natural gas. There are also many promising areas in the northern continental shelf of Russia. In addition to Russia, Svalbard and Greenland have been investigated for oil and gas. Gas hydrates are widespread in both permafrost regions and arctic continental shelf areas. The reserves of gas hydrates in the Arctic Ocean are about 20${\sim}$32% of total estimated amounts of gas hydrates in the world ocean. Mineral mining is well developed, especially in Russia. The major centers are located around the Kuznetsk Basin and Noril'sk. They are major suppliers of gold, tin, nickel, copper, platinum, cobalt, iron ore, coal as well as apatite. There are also some minings of lead-zinc in Alaska and Arctic Canada.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.59-67
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• 2016

In this paper, we perform a numerical analysis to evaluate the potential of fault reactivation during gas production from hydrate bearing sediments and the moment magnitude of induced seismicity. For the numerical analysis, sequential coupling of TOUGH+Hydrate and FLAC3D was used and the change in effective stress and consequent geomechanical deformation including fault reactivation was simulated by assuming that Mohr-Coulomb shear resistance criterion is valid. From the test production simulation of 30 days, we showed that pore pressure reduction as well as effective stress change hardly induces the fault reactivation in the vicinity of a production well. We also investigated the influence of stress state conditions to a fault reactivation, and showed that normal fault stress regime, where vertical stress is relatively greater than horizontal, may have the largest potential for the reactivation. We tested one simulation that earthquake can be induced during gas production and calculated the moment magnitude of the seismicity. Our calculation presented that all the magnitudes from the calculation were negative values, which indicates that induced earthquakes can be grouped into micro-seismic and as small as hardly perceived by human beings. However, it should be noted that the current simulation was carried out using the highly simplified geometric model and assumptions such that the further simulations for a scheduled test production and commercial scale production considering complex geometric conditions may produce different results.

• Geophysics and Geophysical Exploration
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.173-182
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• 2009

In April 2008, KIGAM carried out an ocean-bottom seismometer (OBS) survey in the central Ulleung Basin where strong bottom simulating reflectors (BSRs) were revealed from previous surveys and some gas-hydrate samples were retrieved by direct sampling. The purpose of this survey is to estimate the velocity structure near the BSR in the gas hydrate prospect area using wide-angle seismic data recorded on the ocean-bottom seismometers. Along with the OBS survey, a 2-D seismic survey was performed whereby stratigraphic and preliminary velocity information was obtained. Two methods were applied to wide-angle data for estimating P wave velocity; one is velocity analysis in the $\tau$-p domain and the other is seismic traveltime inversion. A 1-D interval velocity profile was obtained by the first method, which was refined to layered velocity structure by the latter method. A layer stripping method was adopted for modeling and inversion. All velocity profiles at each OBS site clearly show velocity reversal at BSR depths due to the presence of gas hydrates. In addition, we could confirm high velocity in the column/chimney structure.