Study of the Kinetics and Morphology of Gas Hydrate Formation

Abstract

The kinetics and morphology of ethane hydrate formation were studied in a batch type reactor at a temperature of ca. 270–280 K, over a pressure range of 8.83–16.67 bar. The results of the experiments revealed that the formation kinetics were dependant on pressure, temperature, degree of supercooling, and stirring rate. Regardless of the saturation state, the primary nucleation always took place in the bulk of the water and the phase transition was always initiated at the surface of the vortex (gas-water interface). The rate of hydrate formation was observed to increase with an increase in pressure. The effect of stirring rate on nucleation and growth was emphasized in great detail. The experiments were performed at various stirring rates of 110–190 rpm. Higher rates of formation of gas hydrate were recorded at faster stirring rates. The appearance of nuclei and their subsequent growth at the interface, for different stirring rates, was explained by the proposed conceptual model of mass transfer resistances. The patterns of gas consumption rates, with changing rpm, have been visualized as due to a critical level of gas molecules in the immediate vicinity of the growing hydrate particle. Nucleation and decomposition gave a cyclic hysteresis-like phenomena. It was also observed that a change in pressure had a much greater effect on the rate of decomposition than it did on the formation rate. Morphological studies revealed that the ethane hydrate resembles thread or is cotton-like in appearance. The rate of gas consumption during nucleation, with different rpm and pressures, and the percentage decomposition at different pressures, were explained precisely for ethane hydrate.