Efforts to extract the methane are focusing on the Arctic, where tests have shown that gas can be produced from hydrates using conventional drilling and production technology.
Rather than mining solid hydrates, scientists are working on ways to melt the deposits underground. This would free the gas from the ice, allowing the methane to be captured in the same way ordinary natural gas is collected.
More research has to be done to determine how to extract methane safely and efficiently from hydrates' remote locations, scientists say.
Currently most research is focusing on where and how hydrates form.
Michael Riedel of Canada's McGill University in Montreal says that hydrate formation appears to be much more complex than scientists had previously thought.
Based on samples drilled near the coast of Vancouver Island in British Columbia, he said, hydrates appear to be concentrated much closer to the surface of seabeds than previously believed (see British Columbia map).
Hydrates appear to form only in sandy sediments, he added. This may make it hard to estimate how many hydrates are in a region without knowing where the sandy deposits are, he explained.
"They can't just form anywhere," Riedel said.
Global Warming
Other scientists are trying to understand how hydrates might affect the environment.
Because methane is a powerful greenhouse gas, some experts wonder if massive methane releases from melting seabed hydrates might have contributed to past epochs of global warming.
(Read related story: "Ancient Global Warming Spurred Primates Into North America, Fossils Show" [August 2, 2006].)
Others are concerned that current global warming may heat the oceans enough to melt the hydrates, causing similar methane releases today.
(Read related story: "Methane Belches in Lakes Supercharge Global Warming, Study Says" [September 6, 2006].)
Unstable hydrates could also cause underwater landslides, which could damage offshore drilling equipment and possibly create surges large enough to generate tsunamis, according to some models.
Earthquakes pose an additional risk, added Riedel, the McGill scientist.
At a meeting of the American Geophysical Union last December, he compared the effects of quakes on hydrates to shaking a bottle of soda.
"You can get a lot of gas out of it at once," he said.
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