Recent Advancements in Kerogen Research

Topic Information

Dear Colleagues,

Kerogen is a kind of dispersed organic matter insoluble in alkali, non-oxidizing acid, and non-polar organic solvent in oil shale and other source rocks. Despite the continuous development of clean energy, a large amount of fossil energy is still needed to make up for the shortage of clean energy supply in the short term. Therefore, oil shale, as a kind of supplementary energy resource, has become very important for the global energy infrastructure in the 21st century. It is because of this that it is especially important to expand research focused on the development of the efficient and low-cost processing of this type of kerogen and oil shale.

This Topic is devoted to the development of new technologies of oil shale conversion to shale oil and value-added chemicals. The Topic is concerned with, but not limited to, pyrolysis mechanisms, catalytic conversion, in situ conversion, and comprehensive utilization. Research on pyrolysis molecular simulation as well as molecular characterization of kerogen and shale oil is also welcome. Moreover, papers that address these issues from other perspectives but still within the broad range of research applications of the main topic fields are also encouraged.

Prof. Dr. Qing Wang
Prof. Dr. Liang Huang
Dr. Da Cui
Dr. Shuo Pan
Topic Editors

Keywords

Participating Journals

Journal Name	Impact Factor	CiteScore	Launched Year	First Decision (median)	APC
Energies energies	3.2	5.5	2008	16.1 Days	CHF 2600
Geosciences geosciences	2.7	5.2	2011	23.6 Days	CHF 1800
Minerals minerals	2.5	3.9	2011	18.7 Days	CHF 2400
Processes processes	3.5	4.7	2013	13.7 Days	CHF 2400
Fuels fuels	-	-	2020	28.9 Days	CHF 1000

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All Energies Geosciences Minerals Processes Fuels

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15 pages, 17501 KiB  

Open AccessArticle

Molecular Simulation of Methane Adsorption in Deep Shale Nanopores: Effect of Rock Constituents and Water

by Jianfa Wu, Xuefeng Yang, Shan Huang, Shengxian Zhao, Deliang Zhang, Jian Zhang, Chunyu Ren, Chenglin Zhang, Rui Jiang, Dongchen Liu, Qin Yang and Liang Huang

Minerals 2023, 13(6), 756; https://doi.org/10.3390/min13060756 - 31 May 2023

Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1170

Abstract

The molecular models of nanopores for major rock constituents in deep shale were constructed. The microscopic adsorption behavior of methane was simulated by coupling the grand canonical Monte Carlo and Molecular Dynamics methods and the effect of rock constituents was discussed. Based on [...] Read more.

The molecular models of nanopores for major rock constituents in deep shale were constructed. The microscopic adsorption behavior of methane was simulated by coupling the grand canonical Monte Carlo and Molecular Dynamics methods and the effect of rock constituents was discussed. Based on the illite and kerogen nanopore models, the discrepancies in microscopic water distribution characteristics were elucidated, the effects of water on methane adsorption and its underlying mechanisms were revealed, and the competitive adsorption characteristics between water and methane were elaborated. The results show a similar trend in the microscopic distribution of methane between different shale rock constituents. Illite and kerogen slit pores have no significant difference in methane adsorption capacity. The adsorption capacity per unit mass of kerogen is greater than that of illite due to the smaller molar mass of the kerogen skeleton and its large intermolecular porosity. Illite has a greater affinity for water than methane. With increasing water content, water molecules preferentially occupy the high-energy adsorption sites and then overspread the entire pore walls to form water adsorption layers. Methane molecules are adsorbed on the water layers, and methane adsorption has little effect on water adsorption. Kerogen is characterized as mix-wetting. Water molecules are preferentially adsorbed on polar functional groups and gather around to form water clusters. In kerogen with high water content, methane adsorption can facilitate water cluster fusion and suppress water spreading along pore walls. In addition to adsorption, some water molecules dissolve in the kerogen matrix. Full article

(This article belongs to the Topic Recent Advancements in Kerogen Research)

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