Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 8889 (2012) 4147

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Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering

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The gas hydrate potential in the South China Sea

Nguyen Nhu Trung
Institute of Marine Geology and Geophysics, Vietnamese Academy of Science and Technology, Viet Nam

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 2 September 2011
Accepted 9 January 2012
Available online 16 January 2012
Keywords:
Gas hydrate
South China Sea
Gas hydrate stability zone
Unconventional energy

a b s t r a c t
Based on the relationship among water depth, sea water temperature, geothermal gradient and geological
setting, the gas hydrate potential in the South China Sea (SCS) is estimated. The thickness of the gas hydrate
stability zone (GHSZ) and the minimum sea water depth in order to form the gas hydrate structures I (100%
CH4), II (95.9% CH4) and H (90.4% CH4) are calculated and dened by the relationship among sea water depth,
seawater temperature, geothermal gradient and gas composition. The average thickness of the GHSZ in the
SCS is estimated to be 225 m, 270 m and 365 m for the gas hydrate structures I, II and H, respectively. The calculation also shows that the gas hydrate accumulation is at the water depth equal to or deeper than 600 m,
400 m and 300 for gas hydrate structures I, II and H, respectively. Maximum thickness area of the GHSZ in the
SCS is also dened in the water depth ranging from 1200 to 2300 m. By assuming that gas hydrate is distributed in one third of the calculated GHSZ area, the volume of gas hydrate reservoir is estimated to contain
1.38 1014 m 3, 1.41 1014 m 3 and 1.7 10 14 m3 of methane gas at the standard temperature and pressure
(STP) for the gas hydrate structures I, II and H, respectively.
2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Gas hydrate is an ice-like crystal mineral that is formed by water and
hydrocarbon gas or non-hydrocarbon (but main composition is CH4) at
low temperature and high pressure (Milkov and Sassen, 2001). Since
Makogon (1965) announced rst time the presence of gas hydrates in
the permafrost regions of the Soviet Union, gas hydrate has attracted
massive scientic and, not least political attention ever since the last decades of the 20th century because of their duality as being a potential
future energy resource and a threat of geo-hazard and climate change.
Most published research indicates that gas hydrate is widely occurring
everywhere in the ocean in deeper than 300500 m water depth and
also in permafrost results. Kvenvolden and Rogers (2005) compiled 89
gas hydrate sites in the world, in which consist of 23 locations recovered
samples, 63 locations referred from Bottom Simulating Reector (BSR)
and 6 locations interpreted from geological settings. These gures are
not totally reliable, but provide a rst impression of gas hydrate in the
world. While the total amount of hydrated gas is still a matter of dispute, researchers in the world (Klanda and Sandler, 2005) agree that
the total amount of gas in this solid form may surpass the total conventional gas reserve, by an order of magnitude. Most current optimistic
estimation of the U.S. Geological Survey stated that the global natural
gas hydrate reserves are in the range from 100,000 to about
300,000,000 trillion cubic feet comparing with the 13,000 trillion
cubic feet of conventional natural gas reserves (Devinder, et al., 2007).
18 Hoang Quoc Viet, Cau Giay, Hanoi, Viet Nam. Tel.: + 84 4 3 7910137; fax: + 84 4
37561647.
E-mail address: nguyen_nhutrung@hotmail.com.
0920-4105/$ see front matter 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.petrol.2012.01.007

Many issues relating to gas hydrate research are investigated around

the world, for instance, the global carbon cycle, long-term climate
change effects, seaoor stability, hydrate formation and dissociation
properties, future energy resource, physical and chemical properties,
and global distribution of hydrate (Devinder, et al., 2007). Because
hydrates concentrate methane (at STP) by as much as a factor of
164144, and because less than 15% of the recovered energy is required
for dissociation, and while methane is considered as clean energy compared to the other conventional energy sources, hydrate reservoirs have
been considered as an important future energy resource.
The South China Sea (Fig. 1) is a region of interaction among three
major tectonic plates: the Pacic, Indo-Australian and Eurasian. The
collision of the Indian subcontinent with the Eurasian plate in the
northwest, back-arc spreading at the center, and subduction beneath
the Philippine plate along Manila trench in the east and the collision
along Palawan Trough in the south have produced the South China
Sea, the biggest margin sea in the western Pacic, about 32 Ma ago
(Taylor and Hayes, 1983; Tapponnier et al., 1986; Briais et al., 1993).
With the continental slope area of more than 10 6 km 2 and average
water depth of 1.2 km, the SCS is viewed by many as a high potential
gas hydrate region in the world. Gas hydrate investigation in the SCS
has been carried out by Chinese and Taiwanese scientists since
1990s (Guoa et al., 2004). A number of research works presented the
geological, geophysical and geochemical evidences of the gas hydrate
occurrence in Hoang Sa, South Taiwan Basin and Palawan Trough (Chi
et al., 1998, 2006; Chow et al., 2000; Jin and Wang, 2002; Yu et al.,
2004; Wu et al., 2005; Wang et al., 2006 and Yang et al., 2006a,
2006b). In 2007, China announced the rst time to recover gas hydrate
samples at the water depth 1500 m and 200 m below seaoor level in

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N.N. Trung / Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 8889 (2012) 4147

Fig. 1. Bathymetry map of the South China Sea (version 13.1 at http://topex.ucsd.edu/cgi-bin/get_data.cgi, 2009). The SCS has the area of 1.6 106 km2 with a water depth greater
than 300 m and the average depth of 1200 m. Lines and respective numbers indicate segments of prole shown in other gures. Black circles are well locations in the continental
slope.

the Shenhu area, south of the Pearl River Mouth Basin (Zhang et al.,
2007). Most gas hydrate samples so far collected in this area were bacterial methane gas hydrate type I. A number of works (Wang et al.,
2006, Yao 2001; Zeng et al. 2003; Chen et al. 2004; Chi et al., 2006) estimated the thickness of the gas hydrate stability zone (GHSZ) and
amount of gas hydrate in the SCS using a limited and not updated
data of bathymetry, constant geothermal gradient.
New bathymetry data, linear geothermal gradient function and
geological and geochemical information on gas hydrate (Smith and
Sandwell, 1997; He et al., 2001; Yang et al., 2006a, 2006b; Zhang et
al., 2007) allows improvement in the methodology for estimating
the volume of gas hydrate methane in the SCS. Main objectives of
this study are to: (1) model the thickness of the gas hydrate stability
zone by the Milkov and Sassen's method (2001) using linear geothermal gradient function and new bathymetry data. The calculated results are compared to available drilling and BSR data in the region;
(2) estimate roughly the volume of methane gas hydrate in the SCS.
2. Favorable geological and geochemical conditions
2.1. Geological setting
The SCS formed during Late Oligocene-Early Miocene (Taylor and
Hayes, 1983; Hinz and Schluter, 1985; Tapponnier et al., 1986; Briais

et al., 1993) as a result of the collision of Indian subcontinent and

Eurasian plate in the northwest, back-arc spreading in the center
and subduction beneath the Philippine plate along Manila trench in
the east and along Palawan trough in the south. The SCS is a marginal
sea bordered to the north and west by passive continental margins, to
the east and south by convergent margins. It has an area of
1.6 10 6 km 2 with a water depth greater than 300 m and the average
water depth 1200 m. A number of prominent submarine plateaus,
submarine ridges, submarine fans, turbidity fans, accretionary
wedges and mud diapirs are formed on the continental slopes that
are favorable sites for gas hydrate formation, accumulation and conservation. The SCS has 16 Cainozoic hydrocarbon bearing sedimentary basins with the maximum sediment thickness 14,000 m
surrounding the continental shelf and slope. Many oil and gas elds
have been found in this area such as Red River Basin, Beibu Wan
basin, Pearl River Mouth Basin, South Hainam Basin, Phu Khanh
Basin, Nam Con Son Basin, Cuu Long Basin, Natura Basin, Sabah
Brunei Basin (Fig. 2). The thick organic-rich sediments may provide
an important and necessary source of thermogenic gasses via channels and faults to form gas hydrate at shallower levels. We can see
in Fig. 2, there are a lot of deep fault system oriented NS, NWSE,
NESW and volcanoes occurring in the continental shelf and slopes,
for example, the Meridian 110 Fault System (110F, Tuy Hoa Shear
Zone (THZ)) in the western margin, Hoang Sa Fault system (F1) in

N.N. Trung / Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 8889 (2012) 4147

43

Fig. 2. A lot of deep fault systems oriented NS NWSE, NESW occurring in the continental slope of the SCS (Trung et al., 2004; Trung and Huong, in press). BSR anomaly is widespread in the slopes of South China Sea (Trung, 2008; Zhu et al., 2001, Wu et al., 2000; Wu et al., 2005; Chi et al., 1998; Yang et al., 2006a, 2006b, and Deng et al. 2006).

the northern margin. They may be the potential migration pathways

of thermogenic gasses from deep oil and gas reservoir to the GHSZ.
Fig. 3 is a seismic reection prole in the Phu Khanh Basin, continental shelf of Vietnam, showing a gas chimney anomaly with seeps on
the seaoor (Gwang and Watkins, 1998). According to Gwang and
Watkins (1998), the fault crossing from the Pre-Cenozoic basement
to the SB4 sequence boundary (late-early Miocene) in the deep part
of the section probably provides a vertical migration pathway for
the less dense hydrocarbons to spread.
2.2. Geochemical anomalies
The geochemical anomalies can be observed in many places in the
South China Sea including lower chlorine concentration from interstitial water, higher methane concentration from headspace gas,
authigenic siderite nodules with 18O-enrichment, thinner sulfate reduction zone and isotopic composition of carbon and hydrogen in
methane. According to Wu et al. (2000), Zhu et al. (2000, 2002), the
higher hydrocarbon areas and higher thermo luminescence areas
were observed in Hoang Sa Basin, Hoang Sa Trough, Southwestern
Taiwan Basin, and the Manila trench. The sulfate reduction zones
were observed in Palawan trough, south Dongsa Island. The high
CH4 concentration in the bottom water samples can be observed in
the continental slope of Vietnam (Fig. 4).

Fig. 3. Gas seep on the seaoor probably is leaking throughout the fault (after Gwang
and Watkins, 1998).

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N.N. Trung / Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 8889 (2012) 4147

3. Estimation of the thickness of the GHSZ

Fig. 4. The schematic of the observed CH4 anomaly from the continental slope of
Vietnam (after Kulinic, 1989).

2.3. Bottom simulating reector anomalies

A huge multi-channel seismic reection program has been carried
on the offshore of the South China Sea for the oil and gas exploration
and basic scientic and state environmental management survey investigations since early 1970s. A number of seismic proles have
been re-processed specically for gas hydrate investigation in the
northern, western and southern slopes. Bottom Simulating Reector
anomalies (BSR) are identied in the Hoang Sa Trough area (Zhang,
et al., 2002), in some seismic proles near the Dongsha Islands the
southeast of Dongsha Islands (Song et al., 2001) and in Truong Sa archipelago, TuchinhVungmay Basin and Phu Khanh Basin. We can see
that BSR anomaly is widespread in the slopes of South China Sea
(Fig. 2). These BSRs usually occur in Pliocene and Quaternary sediments with a burial depth of some hundreds meter at water depths
between 1200 and 3000 m. Fig. 5 is a multi-seismic prole in the
TuchinhVungmay showing a BSR anomaly clearly in the upper part
of the section. Recently, a number of seismic explorations were carried out for gas hydrate investigation in Shenhu area in the south of
Pearl River Mouth Basin and in the South Taiwan Basin (Chow et al.,
2000; Guoa, et al., 2004; Chi et al., 2006; Zhang et al., 2007), also
detected a lot of BSR anomalies. Especially, 1020 m thick of gas hydrate containing sediment layers were collected directly above the
base of gas hydrate stability in the Shenhu area, which was 200 m
below seaoor level. Fortunately, the distribution areas of BSRs usually coincide with the geochemical anomalies distribution areas.

The GHSZ is a specic range of pressure and temperature conditions in the subsurface within which hydrocarbon gasses become stable as gas hydrate (Booth, et al., 1998). So the GHSZ thickness is
affected by water depth, bottom water temperature, geothermal gradient, pore water salinity and gas available composition in sediment.
Milkov and Sassen (2001) put forward a quantitative model to describe these effects and calculate the GHSZ thickness of bacterial
methane gas hydrate structure I and thermogenic structures II and
H in the Gulf of Mexico continental slope. This method does not require any special condition, but only bathymetry, sea water temperature and geothermal gradient. By this way, the thickness of the GHSZ
for three gas hydrate structures I, II and H in the SCS can be predicted
just from the basic data as the bathymetry, water temperature and
geothermal gradient data.
The bathymetry of the SCS is outlined in Fig. 1. This depth data set
was established based on the combination of all international echo
sounding data and new depth data calculated from satellite altimetry.
It, version 13.1 at http://topex.ucsd.edu/cgi-bin/get_data.cgi (2009),
produces a data set in scale 1 1 grid. The water depth ranges from
200 m along the continental shelf to around 4200 m in the abyss. Sea
water temperature in the SCS ranges from 10.5 C7.5 C at water
depth 300500 m to 5 C2.5 C at water depth 10003000 m. The
relationship between water temperature and water depth can be
approximated by the power function (Wang et al., 2006):
0:6269

Tw 373:41  B

where Tw is bottom water temperature (C); and B is water depth in

meters (B 100 m) below sea level (mbsl).
The distribution of geothermal gradient measurement sites is not
even in the SCS. Most measurement sites concentrated in the oil
and gas elds in the continental shelf. There are three proles in the
northern continental slope and one prole in the Central Basin (He
et al., 2001; Nissen and Hayes, 1995). There are only very few sites
in the east and west continental margin. There are ve wells in the
north and south continental slopes to measure geothermal gradient.
According to the geothermal gradient data, the SCS is characterized
by a high background geothermal gradient. The geothermal gradient
increases from the continental shelf to the Central Basin. It shows a
relationship between geothermal gradient and water depth: at the
shallow water depth (b1000 m) demonstrate the low geothermal
gradient in the sediment (b 80 C/km) and the deeper water depth
area demonstrate high geothermal gradient in the sediment (above
80 C/km to 160 C/km). The average value of the northern margin
is similar to the southern margin (He et al., 2001). Based on the
geothermal gradient data in the wells in the northern and southern
continental margin (Prell et al., 1999; Truong et al., 2000), the linear
function that best ts the geothermal gradient and water depth relationship is dened by the following formula:
G 0:01593  B 28:39

where G is geothermal gradient (C/km) and B is the water depth in

meter below sea level. This equation is used to estimate the geothermal gradient cross the study region.
Therefore, the temperature of sediment at any depth below seaoor level is dened by summing the seawater temperature at the
seaoor (i.e. Eq. (1) with B being the seaoor depth) and geothermal
gradient in the sediment (i.e. Eq. (2)):
Ts 0:01593  B 28:39  C=1000 373:41  B
Fig. 5. Multi-seismic prole shows the BSR anomaly in the southeastern continental
slope of Vietnam.

0:6269

where Ts is the temperature in sediment at depth C below seaoor

level; C is the depth below seaoor level (km); B is the seaoor depth.

N.N. Trung / Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 8889 (2012) 4147
Table 1
Molecular composition of vent gas used to estimate the gas hydrate stability condition
(Sassen, et al., 1999).
Types of gas hydrate

C1

C2

C3

i-C4

n-C4

i-C5

n-C5

I
II
H

100
95.9
90.4

2.4
4.5

1.2
3.7

b0.1
0.6

0.3
0.6

0.2
0.2

b 0.1
b 0.1

Because of the change in pore water salinity in the SCS is very

small (Xue et al. 1991; Zeng and Zhou 2003; Chen et al. 2004), so in
this study we assumed pore water salinity to be 3.5%. A number of
works (Prell et al., 1999; Zhu et al., 2005; Yang et al., 2006a, 2006b)
suggested that both bacterial gas hydrate (structure I) and thermogenic gas hydrate (structures II and H) sources may be present in
the SCS. The rst and unique gas hydrate samples in bacterial source
have been collected in the Shenhu area in the northern continental
margin of the SCS. Therefore, in this study, three kinds of different
gas molecular compositions (Table 1) are used to represent biogenic,
mixed and thermogenic gasses in the SCS.
Milkov and Sassen (2001) used Sloan's (1998) CSMHYD hydrate
program to calculate the equilibrium conditions of gas hydrate crystallization for gas hydrate structures I, II and H (see Table 1) with assuming 3.5% pore water salinity. The obtained diagram shows in Fig. 6. The
logarithmic functions describe the best t to the gas hydrate stability
curves for gas hydrate structures I, II and H as follows (Milkov and
Sassen, 2001):
T100%CH4 8:9  LnD50:1

T95:9%CH4 7:1  LnD33:9

T90:4%CH4 6:7  LnD27:6

where T is the temperature (C) at depth D (m) where gas hydrate is

stable. The hydrostatic pressure of water column and sediments in
this study assumed a linear hydrostatic gradient 10 MPa/km. Fig. 6
shows that the CH4 composition in the natural gasses is not so much
different, but the equilibrium conditions of gas hydrate crystallizations are quite different in the temperature and pressure.
The Eq. (3) describes the temperature of the sediment increasing
gradually in depth. So the lower boundary of the GHSZ of the gas

Fig. 6. Gas hydrate stability curves of three vent gasses (100% CH4, 95.9% CH4 and 90.4
CH4) were calculated by using Sloan's (1998) CSMHYD hydrate program (Milkov and
Sassen, 2001).

45

hydrate structures I, II and H occurs at the intersection point of

Eqs. (3) and (4), (5) and (6), respectively. The problem of dening
the lower boundary of the GHSZ becomes the problem of nding
the zero point of the functions:
h
i
0:6269
FB100%CH4 0:012  B 62:20  C=1000 373:41  B
8:9  LnC B50:1

h
i
0:6269
FB95:9%CH4 0:012  B 62:20  C=1000 373:41  B
7:1  LnC B33:9

h
i
0:6269
FB90:4%CH4 0:012  B 62:20  C=1000 373:41  B
6:7  LnC B27:6

where B is the seaoor depth (m); C is the thickness of the GHSZ (m).
The zero point of these functions (7), (8) and (9) can be dened by
Newton's method (http://www.math.sc.edu/cgi-bin/sumcgi/Newton.
pl). Fig. 7 shows the nal result of the calculation of the thickness of
the GHSZ for three vent gas compositions in Table 1. Fig. 7 shows
that at the same water depth, the thickness of the GHSZ is thinner
when the concentration of CH4 in the vent gas is higher. Fig. 7 also
shows that when the water depth exceeds a certain value (approximately 12002300 m water depth), the thickness of the GHSZ actually plateaus and may decline. This result is in contrast to that of Wang
et al.'s work (2006) because Wang et al. (2006) assumed the geothermal gradient is constant 37.5 C for the whole study area. But in fact,
the geothermal gradient increases from shallow water (the continental shelf) to the deep water area (the abyss).
The diagram in Fig. 7 is used to dene the thickness of the GHSZ in
any given water depth in the study area. The maps in Fig. 8 show the
calculated thickness of the GHSZ in the SCS using the water depth
from Fig. 1. The calculated results of the thickness of the GHSZ in
Fig. 8 show that:
For gas hydrate structure I (100% CH4), the GHSZ layer is formed at
the water depth being deeper than 600 m and the average thickness
of the GHSZ is 225 m. The maximum thickness of the GHSZ is 260 m
at water depth 2300 m.
For gas hydrate structure II (95.9% CH4), the GHSZ layer is formed
at the water depth being deeper than 400 m and the average thickness of the GHSZ is 270 m. The maximum thickness of the GHSZ is
300 m at water depth 1800 m.

Fig. 7. The diagram of the calculated thickness of the GHSZ vs. depth water in the SCS. It
is used to dene the thickness of the GHSZ at any water depth in the study area.

46

N.N. Trung / Journal of Petroleum Science and Engineering 8889 (2012) 4147

Fig. 8. Maps of the calculated thickness of the GHSZ (in meter) for the gas hydrate structures I (100% CH4), II (95.9% CH4) and H (90.4% CH4) in the SCS. The actual GHSZ is thinner
in the shallow water depth and very deep water (> 2500 m).

For gas hydrate structure H (90.4% CH4), the GHSZ layer is formed
at the water depth being deeper than 300 m and the average thickness of the GHSZ is 330 m. The maximum thickness of the GHSZ is
365 m at water depth 1200 m. The GHSZ is thinner in the deeper
and shallower water depth area.
According to the calculated result the thickness of the GHSZ is
biggest at water depth from 1200 to 2300 m. The GHSZ in the SCS
can be distributed from 300 m to 3000 m water depth with the total
area 1.1 10 6 km 2.
4. Primary estimation of gas hydrate methane
The amounts of the methane gas (CH4) released from gas hydrate
at standard temperature and pressure (STP) can be calculated by the
following formula:
Q CH4 S  z   E

10

where S is the distribution area of the gas hydrate (m 2); z is the

average thickness of the GHSZ; is the saturation of gas hydrate in
sediments (%); E is the amount of CH4 releasing from 1 m 3 gas hydrate
at STP.
The concentration of gas hydrate accumulated in sediment varies
greatly from place to place, even within an individual gas hydrate deposit (or system). It is very in high some places, for example, it is as
much as 3040% of sediment volume in Okhotsk sea (Ginsburg and
Soloviev, 1998), whereas some other places it is very small, for example, it is 1.2% of sediment volume in Haakon Mosby (Ginsburg et al.,
1999), 0.27.0% in the Gulf of Mexico (Milkov, 2000). Limited data
is available on gas hydrate concentration in the SCS. The only example
of bacterial gas hydrate accumulation is located at 200 m below seaoor level in Shanhu area, the south of Pearl River Mouth Basin
(Haiqi et al., 2007). According to published measurements the average gas hydrate saturation in marine sediments worldwide is about
1.2%, ranging from 0.9 to 1.5% (Ginsburg and Soloviev, 1998). So the
gas hydrate saturation 1.2% is used in this calculation in the SCS. Yu
et al. (2004) estimated optimistically gas hydrate occurring in half
of the continental slope area of the SCS. In some continental slope
areas of the world, 3040% of sediment within the GHSZ may be gas
hydrate-bearing (Ginsburg and Soloviev, 1998). Because only limited
data is available in the SCS, we assume gas hydrate is only occurring
in 30% area of the calculated GHSZ. The amount of methane gas release from 1 m 3 of gas hydrate at standard temperature and pressure

is assumed to be 164 m 3 for gas hydrate structure I and 140 m 3 for

gas hydrate structures II and H (Sloan, 1998). On this basis, the total
volume of methane gas at the STP can be estimated to be
1.38 10 14 m 3, 1.41 10 14 m 3 and 1.7 10 14 m 3 for gas hydrate
types I, II and H, respectively.
5. Conclusion
The SCS has satisfactory conditions of temperature, pressure and
organic sources to form and feed gas hydrate stability zone at water
depth 600, 400 and 300 m for gas hydrate structures I, II and H, respectively. Total area of the GHSZ estimates 1.1 10 6 km 2 in the SCS.
The average thickness of the GHSZ could be 225, 270 and 356 m
for gas hydrate structure types I, II and H, respectively. The maximum
thickness of the GHSZ in the SCS is dened at water depth from 1200
to 2300 m. This area is looked as a highest potential region on gas hydrate reservoir.
With assuming 30% area of the GHSZ contains gas hydrate along
the continental slope of the SCS and the average saturation of gas hydrate in sediments is 1.2%, the volume of methane gas at STP can be
estimated to be 1.38 10 14 m 3, 1.41 10 14 m 3 and 1.7 10 14 m 3 for
gas hydrate types I, II and H, respectively.
Acknowledgment
This work was supported by the National Foundation for Science
and Technology Development, Vietnam (NAFOSTED), Grant No.
105.04.07.09. Figures were prepared using Generic Mapping Tool
(Wessel and Smith, 2005). The author thanks Kimberley Patrick for
the English language correction.
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