Seventh Mississippi State - UAB Conference on Differential Equations and Computational Simulations. Electron. J. Diff. Eqns., Conference 17 (2009), pp. 1--11

Methane hydrate formation and decomposition

Vasilios Alexiades

Abstract:
Methane hydrates, in arctic permafrost and deep ocean sediments, store vast amounts of methane, which is the primary constituent of natural gas and a potent greenhouse gas.
Methane hydrate is a crystaline solid consisting of methane surrounded by frozen water molecules. It is stable in a narrow range of high pressures and low temperatures. Thus, issues affecting the stability of hydrate layers and phase change processes that may disturb this stability are of utmost importance.
We present simulations with an isobaric compositional thermal model, based on conservation laws for species and energy, which allows composition, temperature, and pressure dependence of material properties, with thermodynamically consistent treatment of phase behavior via equations of state.

Published April 15, 2009.
Math Subject Classifications: 92C45, 35K60, 65M99.
Key Words: Phase change; enthalpy; heat conduction; diffusion; thermochemistry; gas hydrates; finite volume scheme.

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Vasilios Alexiades
Department of Mathematics
University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN 37996, USA.
and Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, TN 37831, USA.
email: alexiades@utk.edu

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