So, a few years back when natural gas had just droppped to about $4/MMBtu due to the shale gas boom, I was doing research for a VC fund that wanted to invest in

So, a few years back when natural gas had just droppped to about $4/MMBtu due to the shale gas boom, I was doing research for a VC fund that wanted to invest in startups that converted methane to valuable products. One of the most promising routes was to upgrade it to methanol; from there you can make chemicals with higher value, not just fuels to burn. The problem is that oxidation of methane is very unselective, meaning once you break the C-H bond it’ll cascade into carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide very quickly. I think the current record for methanol yield from methane oxidation is something abysmal like 3%. The last slide of my presentation for them was about methane clathrates, basically reaffirming that yeah, this is definitely an area you should invest in because there’s literally an untapped ocean of methane that people will eventually dig up.