Computer simulation of CO2 hydrate growth

In this work we present a model which is a hybrid of cellular automata and Monte Carlo to study the growth of CO2 hydrate from aqueous solutions. We show that, depending on how large the driving forces are, the hydrate crystal may gr ow as compact structures or as a highly branched structure. Furthermore we show that the diffusion of CO2 in the solution is the main limiting factor, unless the solution has a large supersaturation. Temperature effects are shown only to be important at large supersaturations. (c) 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.