UNSW partners TERI to develop application for coal seam gas wells

The Dollar Business Bureau 

The University of New South Wales (UNSW Australia) has announced it will partner The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) to develop industrial application for the phenomenon in coal seams gas wells controlled by ONGC.  

"A novel Australian research breakthrough that promises to dramatically increase gas yields from coal seams and biogas plants will be trialled for industrial application for the first time in partnership with ONGC," UNSW Australia announced in a statement on Tuesday.  

In its recent funding, the Australia India Strategic Research Fund (AISRF) has approved a new grant one million Australian Dollar to support the project. 

Simply by adding a common synthetic dye, microbiologists at UNSW Australia have demonstrated a tenfold increase in the volume of methane generated by microbes in coal seams, and even larger gains in biogas derived from agricultural and food waste, it said.  

The researchers from UNSW have already replicated gains in gas volumes outside the laboratory.

Its India-based trials will enable the company to manufacture a battery of industrial scale tests, factoring in various key factors including temperature and coal seam pressure. It will also enable the development of new technologies, which, in turn, will introduce the dye. 

This breakthrough could substantially enhance gas yields from bio-digesters which use organic waste to generate methane, and the life of coal seam gas wells.

The project would also deliver new fundamental knowledge about methane-producing microbes phenomenon.