Abstract: Starting from the industrial age to the information age, energy has dominated the world and truly, has served as the foundation for mankind’s progress. Increasing energy demand due to growing population, urbanization and industrialization, and depletion of natural resources have stimulated an intensive research in finding a vector of energy sources. India has a huge reserve of natural gas, the cleanest fossil fuel, in hydrated form that can provide energy security for a couple of decades, if not centuries. This apart, gas hydrates are relevant as a crucial factor in climate change since methane escaping seems to occur from dissociated hydrates. As of now, gas hydrate has not been exploited commercially as a source of natural gas due to the lack of technological advancement. This presentation would aim for a comprehensive understanding of gas hydrates and insights into the fundamentals of their dynamics at diverse geological conditions. Further, it will focus on various challenges involved in gas hydrate technology and the possible ways to overcome them.
Bio: Amiya K Jana is an associate professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur. He obtained his Bachelors degree in Chemical Engineering from Jadavpur University, and both MTech and PhD in Chemical Engineering from IIT Kharagpur. He has received research funds as principal investigator (PI) from DST, DAE (BRNS), CSIR, MHRD, ISRO, among others. He has published about 130 research articles in several international journals of repute. He is the sole author of 3 text books in the area of numerical analysis, modeling, simulation and control. Dr. Jana has received numerous awards and recognition, including Faculty Excellence Award (IIT Kharagpur, 2021), Fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (Germany, 2017), World’s Top 2% Scientist for three consecutive years (Stanford University, 2020 - 22), editorial board member of Scientific Reports (Nature Group), Frontiers in Control Engineering (Frontiers Publisher, Switzerland). His research focuses on renewable energy, clean fuel, desalination, process integration and control.