Student: Victor J.

Pugliese Manotas
R#: 11492336
Course: Production facilities and processes
Review of An alternative to API 14E erosional velocity limits for sand-
laden fluids, written by Mamdouh M. Salama. [1]
Erosion is defined as the removal of material from a solid surface by the
repeated application of mechanical forces. In order to avoid erosion damage,
the current oil industry practice for sizing process piping, flow lines, pipelines
and tubing, is to limit the flow velocity to the maximum erosional velocity
calculated by the API RP 14E equation. This equation take in count the
gas/liquid mixture density and an empirical constant, and it has been
demonstrated that this equation is extremely conservative. Moreover, it does
not provide guidelines for sand or corrosive conditions.
Erosion is affected by flow velocity, type of fluid, service frequency, hardness of
pipe material, presence of solid particles, tubing accessories, corrosion
protection or inhibitors to suppress corrosion, between others factors. For this
reason, the definition of an equation that include all these factors and being
simple enough is hard to achieve. The author proposed the following approach:
For solid-free, noncorrosive fluids, providing pressure drop is not a concern, the
maximum flow rate can be established using the following form of API RP 14E
equation:
400
V=
m
For sand-laden fluids, the maximum flow rate limit can be established using the
following equation:

D m
V e=
20 W

Nomenclature
D : Pipe internal diameter in mm.

V : Maximum fluid velocity limit in ft/s.

V e : Erosional velocity limit in m/s.

W : sand flow rate in kg/day.

m : Gas-liquid mixture density at flowing pressure and temperature.

Reference

[1 M. M. Salama, An alternative to API 14E erosional velocity limits for sand-

] laden fluids, Journal of Energy Resources Technology, vol. 122, pp. 71-77,
2000.