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China: Huge hydrate gas discovery made in Tibet
27 Sep 2009
China has said it has found gas hydrates on the Tibetan Plateau worth 35 billion tons of oil equivalent in energy. Before that gas hydrates had been discovered on land only in Canada and the United States. China will be able to harvest and use the hydrate gas in about 10 years, China’s official China Daily online, cited.
The finding of the hydrates, also known as combustible ice, was announced by China’s Ministry of Land and Resources at a press conference Sep 25. The official China Daily online Sep 26 said the hydrates were found in the permanently frozen subsoil to the south of Qilian Mountain in Qilan County (Tibetan: Chilen or Dola) County of Haibei (Tibetan: Tsojang) Prefecture, Qinghai province.
Combustible ice is made of crystallized solids formed when water, methane and other substances interact under low-temperature and high-pressure conditions, effectively freezing gas molecules inside water molecules.
China has become the third country successfully excavating gas hydrate from a land-based area in the world after Canada and the United States, the ministry said.
Source: Tibetan Review
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