Hydrate Formation Loaded by an Activated Carbon Bed in 3D-Printed Containers

To improve the understanding on methane storage in wet porous media under hydrate favorable conditions, hydrate formation loaded by an activated carbon bed in three three-dimensional printed containers was carried out, while the recycling performance of the activated carbon bed was also evaluated. As expected, due to low permeability of the bed, poor hydrate kinetics was observed for small particles, but this is improved by increasing the exposure of the bed. When there is hydrate formation loaded by an activated carbon bed in a container, the specific contact area governs hydrate nucleation and growth kinetics, and the accessibility of methane with inner water increases with the increase in gas–solid contact area, giving rise to fast hydrate nucleation and large methane uptake. Impressively, the hydrate induction time for container 3 is only 3.53 and 41.79% of that in container 1 under the filling ratios (volume ratio of the sample to container) of 80 and 100% separately, while the methane uptake increases by about 8% for both the scenarios. In addition, because of the migration of water to side walls, exceptional recycling performance of the activated carbon bed was also observed, and this characteristic causes the bed to be easily charged and discharged like a battery. These findings may pave the way for the application of the adsorbed natural gas technology using wet activated carbon under hydrate-favorable conditions.