Ratification of UNCLOS is key to helping U.S industries figure out methane hydrate industry potential

Ratification of the Law of the Sea Convention also has an important bearing on a longer-term potential energy source that has been the subject of much research and investigation at the U.S. Department of Energy for several years: gas hydrates.

Gas hydrates are ice-like crystalline structures of water that form “cages” that trap low molecular weight gas molecules, especially methane, and have recently attracted international attention from government and scientific communities. World hydrate deposits are estimated to total more than twice the world reserves of all oil, natural gas and coal deposits combined.

Methane hydrates have been located in vast quantities around the world in continental slope deposits and permafrost. They are believed to exist beyond the EEZ. If the hydrates could be economically recovered, they represent an enormous potential energy resource. In the U.S. offshore, hydrates have been identified in Alaska, all along the West Coast, in the Gulf of Mexico, and in some areas along the East Coast. The technology does not now exist to extract methane hydrates on a commercial scale. Joint industry/government groups of scientists have been at work in the Gulf of Mexico examining the hydrate potential in several deepwater canyons. This work is intended to help companies find and analyze hydrates seismically and to complete an area-wide profile of hydrate deposits.