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Geology; December 2003; v. 31; no. 12; p. 1057-1060; DOI: 10.1130/G19863.1
© 2003 Geological Society of America
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Critical pressure and multiphase flow in Blake Ridge gas hydrates

Peter B. Flemings*,1, Xiaoli Liu*,1 and William J. Winters*,2

1 Department of Geosciences, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802, USA
2 U.S. Geological Survey, 384 Woods Hole Road, Woods Hole, Massachusetts 02543, USA

We use core porosity, consolidation experiments, pressure core sampler data, and capillary pressure measurements to predict water pressures that are 70% of the lithostatic stress, and gas pressures that equal the lithostatic stress beneath the methane hydrate layer at Ocean Drilling Program Site 997, Blake Ridge, offshore North Carolina. A 29-m-thick interconnected free-gas column is trapped beneath the low-permeability hydrate layer. We propose that lithostatic gas pressure is dilating fractures and gas is migrating through the methane hydrate layer. Overpressured gas and water within methane hydrate reservoirs limit the amount of free gas trapped and may rapidly export methane to the seafloor.

Key Words: methane hydrate • methane flux • overpressure • slope stability • gas migration • climate • seep




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