中国点燃了可燃冰，要改变世界的能源格局了

For the first time, Chinese engineers have successfully extracted natural gas from icy deposits beneath the South China Sea.

中国工程师首次成功地从中国南海下方的冰冻沉积物中提取出天然气。

Just last year, China's government announced that geologists had found new reserves of methane hydrate - also known as 'flammable ice' - and now it looks like they've managed to harvest some of it, bringing the world a step closer to harnessing this untapped energy source.

就在去年，中国政府宣布，地质学家发现了新的储备甲烷水合物，也就是“可燃冰”，如今他们似乎已设法获取了一部分可燃冰，使世界离使用这种未利用的能源又近了一步。

"If gas is present at sufficient concentrations beneath the seafloor within the gas hydrate stability field, you'd expect it to be in the form of hydrates," New Zealand-based geoscientist, Ingo Pecher from the University of Auckland said.

“如果在天然气水合物稳定地带的海底之下，天然气充分浓缩，你会期望它呈水合物的形态，”来自奥克兰大学的新西兰地质科学家英格·佩彻说道。

But that stability field is easily disrupted if you change either pressure or temperature, releasing all that trapped methane into the water. That's why successfully extracting gas from methane hydrates is such a big deal for engineers.

但是如果你改变压力或温度，这一稳定地带就很容易被破坏，把所有聚集的甲烷释放到水中。这就是成功从甲烷水合物中提取天然气对工程师如此重要的原因了。

The gas deposits are densely packed - 1 cubic metre of methane hydrate can release 164 cubic metres of natural gas if brought to the surface, making it a valuable fuel resource.

天然气沉积物的密度很高，如果被带出海面，1立方米的甲烷水合物就可以释放164立方米的天然气，这也使它成为一种宝贵的燃料资源。

Researchers think there could be immensely abundant gas hydrate reserves all around the world, possibly exceeding all other fossil fuels combined.

研究人员认为世界各地可能有非常丰富的天然气水合物储备，可能超过了所有其他化石燃料的总量。

Now China has announced that their floating gas extraction platform in the South China Sea has borne highly promising results, and not just for experimental purposes, but for potential commercialisation.

如今中国表示，不仅在实验上，而且在潜在的商业化上，中国南海的浮动天然气开采平台都展现出广阔的发展前景。

Engineers drilled to the bottom of the sea and depressurised the hydrates right there, bringing the gas to the surface. According to reports in Chinese media, they managed to get as much as 35,000 cubic metres of gas a day.

工程师在海底钻孔并减轻那里的水合物的压力，然后把天然气带出海面。据中国媒体报道，他们设法每天获取35,000立方米的天然气。

Countries such as US, Japan, China, India and South Korea have invested hundreds of millions of dollars into exploring methane hydrates, but they've all been slow-going in developing the most cost- and energy-efficient method of extraction.

美国、日本、中国、印度以及韩国等国家都投入了亿万美元来勘探甲烷水合物，然而在开发最经济、节能的提取方法上，各国的进展都十分缓慢。

China's latest success is a promising step towards commercialisation of this energy-intensive fuel source.

中国的最新成果有望使这种能源密集型燃料走向商业化。