FROZEN HEAT | Volume 2

funding, with industry participation. The desire to conduct tests of extended duration requires facilities and infrastruc- ture that are accessible year-round. The most cost-effective of such locations are in the Arctic, close to areas of existing industry activity (see Text Boxes 3.2), and ultimately, learn- ing derived in the Arctic will be tested in offshore settings. Besides the inherent complexities associated with offshore operations, a particular challenge in this setting is the shal-

low sub-sea-floor depth and structural complexity of the can- didate reservoirs (Konno et al. 2010; Nagakubo et al. 2011).

Given the current status of gas hydrate production research and the challenges and complexities of proposed future re- search and development efforts, it is unlikely that meaning- ful production of gas from gas hydrates will occur within the next decade.

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