Mechanisms for kinetic hydrate inhibitors

The importance of kinetic hydrate inhibitors is increasing due to its low cost compared to thermodynamic inhibitors and the corresponding benefits for exploitation of small marginal fields. This stimulates further investigations of the primary mechanisms for the induction times before onset of massive hydrate growth. The hypothesis in this work is that combinations of transport rate limitations and reduced contact area between water and hydrate former may account for very much of the delay. We demonstrate this by simplified calculations, which compares well with available experimental results. Key-Words: kinetics; methane; water; hydrate; inhibitor