EFFECTS OF IMPURITIES ON HYDRATE FORMATION

• Main Author: ANGIE PERNG, SIOW YEN
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS 2009
• Subjects: TP Chemical technology
• Online Access: http://utpedia.utp.edu.my/9211/1/2009%20Bachelor%20-%20Effects%20Of%20Impurities%20On%20Hydrate%20Formation.pdf; http://utpedia.utp.edu.my/9211/

A hydrate is a physical combination of water and other small molecules to produce a solid which has an 'ice-like' appearance but possesses a different structure than ice. The formation of hydrates can plug pipelines, equipments, instruments and restrict or interrupt the gas flow. The objectives of this research project are to study the effect of hydrogen sulfide and ethane in the equilibrium conditions of hydrate formation, effect of temperature and pressure governing the formation ofthe hydrate in the presence of the targeted impurities, effect ofwater gas ratio in feed on pressure formation of CH4, C02, C2H6 and H2S hydrate, effect of water gas ratio in feed on pressure formation of CH4, CO2, C2H6 and H2S hydrate and the effect of temperature on hydrate phase equilibrium composition of CH4, C02, C2H6 and H2S mixture hydrate. The research project utilizes the iCON software, Excel and K-factor methods to obtain the hydrate formation temperature, pressure and phase equilibrium composition of the gas hydrate. Temperature and composition of gas and water are input as the manipulative variable whereas pressure is the dependant variable. Findings from the research show that as temperature increases, formation pressure increases. Formation pressure decreases as the amount of hydrogen sulfide and ethane content increases. Increment in water to gas ratio caused formation pressure to increase. When pressure increases, amount of impurities incorporated in the hydrate decreases. v