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College of Information and Control Engineering, China University of Petroleum, Qingdao 266580, China
Process Systems Engineering Group, School of Engineering, Craneld University, Bedfordshire MK43 0AL, United Kingdom
c
Chevron Energy Technology Company, Houston, TX 77002, United States
b
a r t i c l e
i n f o
Article history:
Received 16 December 2012
Received in revised form 30 August 2013
Accepted 22 April 2014
Available online 2 May 2014
Keywords:
Hydrodynamic slug ow
3D1D coupling
CFD
STAROLGA coupling
Slug mitigation
Wavy pipe
a b s t r a c t
Objective: A wavy pipe, constructed by connecting standard piping bends in series in one plane, was proposed to mitigate hydrodynamic slug ows in horizontal pipelines.
Methods: A newly developed 3D1D co-simulation method, i.e. STAROLGA coupling, was applied to
model the wavy-pipe systems experiencing hydrodynamic slug ows. The ow characteristics of slug
ow in the wavy-pipe systems were investigated, through which the effectiveness of the wavy pipe on
slug mitigation and how the geometrical parameters of the wavy pipe affecting its performance were
examined.
Results: It has been found that the upstream liquid slug degenerates into a liquid dense zone of a
greater length downstream of the wavy pipe due to the gas penetration into the slug body. A reduction
of the effective density of the liquid dense zone from that of the upstream slug body is resultant showing
the effectiveness of the wavy pipe on mitigating the adverse impacts of slug ow. The amount of gas penetration increases then decreases with the increasing wavy-pipe amplitude indicating that excessively
higher amplitude is even less effective on introducing the gas phase into the slug body. Differently a wavy
pipe with the same amplitude but a greater length, i.e. more bends, is more effective.
Conclusions: It is concluded that the wavy pipe works by reducing the effective density of the liquid slug
through introducing the gas phase into the slug body in the push-out process in each bend of the wavy
pipe and the geometrical parameters need to be designed properly in specic applications.
2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
Gas/liquid slug ow is frequently encountered during the transportation of oil and gas in pipelines. There is usually a signicant
length of multiphase owline upstream of the processing facilities
in the offshore production systems and it often happens that signicant gas surges and liquid slugs are generated in the owline.
The liquid slugs generated in oil and gas multiphase owlines
can be classied into three different types based on their initiation
mechanisms [1,2]:
Terrain-induced slugs: caused by periodic accumulation and
purging of liquid in elevation changes along the owline, particularly at low owrates.
105
2. Experimental setup
2.1. Geometry of wavy pipe
A wavy pipe is a pipe section constructed by connecting a series
of standard piping bends in one plane. The elementary unit in a
wavy pipe is one piping bend, which can be described with three
geometrical parameters, i.e. the internal diameter of the tube (d),
the bend radius (R) and the bend angle (a) as shown in Fig. 1(a).
Different geometries can be created by joining several bends
together in different manners. Four 90 bends connecting together
ID
761937
Title
Study on hydrodynamic slug flow mitigation with wavy pipe using a 3D1D coupling approach
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Pages
12