Daniel Praeg investigates gas hydrates on Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions grant
Photo: Thais Gonçalves
A native of Canada, researcher Daniel Praeg has conducted a number of investigations at institutions in Scotland, Ireland and Italy. He has been working at the Institute of Petroleum and Natural Resources of PUCRS since 2018. His collaborative project, SEAGAS, involves French laboratory Géoazur from Nice, and is being developed in support of a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) Global Fellowship, a systems of grants for international mobility, sponsored by the European Union.
Praeg came to PUCRS for the first time in 2010 for an international conference on carbon. He returned in 2011 and 2012 for other international cooperation projects. The Canadian researcher’s current investigation has been developed in partnership with PUCRS and Géoazur, but involves other institutions from Brazil and Europe. This includes a collaboration between PUCRS and some universities from Rio de Janeiro (UFF and UERJ) on the estuary of the Amazon River.
“I had the European project suspended since Apr 2018 to spend a year as a visiting researcher at UFF (on a CAPES grant) in order to pursue this investigation. I came back to Porto Alegre in the beginning of Apr 2019 to continue working on SEAGAS”, he says.
SEAGAS
The project SEAGAS seeks to compare the dynamics of gas hydrates systems at the coasts of Brazil and the Mediterranean. Gas hydrates are a form of ice (H2O) containing notable quantities of gas (mostly methane, CH4) which develop at high pressures and low temperatures. This gives them stability on the oceans and at depths below 300 meters.
It is estimated that frozen gas hydrates inside underwater sediments constitute the largest carbon reserve on Earth. Today, they are not used as commercial resources, but some countries are working on this possibility. However, they are of interest to science since changes in its stability can lead to the liberation of methane on the oceans (the powerful greenhouse gas). This would have implications on the global climate as well as on the stability of sediments on the coasts.
“Under SEAGAS, we’re looking at gas leakage phenomena down deep in the ocean in areas where there is a proliferation of gas hydrates in the Mediterranean (a semi-closed sea) and on the Brazilian coast (the Atlantic). Our original idea was to use the different clime changes these areas went thought to try out the clime-related changes in stability of gas hydrates because of changes in the oceans. Instead, our results provide evidence of how the dynamics of gas hydrates in the deep sea can be controlled from the bottom to the top, especially because of the migration of fluids within the fan”, Praeg says.
About MSCA
The MSCA is a system of grants for international mobility, sponsored by the European Union. It is open for researchers from all over the world, including Brazil. Several MSCA schemes are available. They allow for PhD students and postdoc fellows to work on research projects and training, involving mobility from Brazil to Europe, or from Europe to Brazil. In April, Praeg delivered a lecture on the opportunities for faculty of PUCRS. The next call ends on Sep 12, 2019.
