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Application of Relative Sensitivity Function in

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DOI: 10.1016/j.jngse.2015.04.028

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 Journal of Natural Gas Science and Engineering 25 (2015) 39e45

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Journal of Natural Gas Science and Engineering

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jngse

Application of relative sensitivity function in parametric optimization

of a tri-ethylene glycol dehydration plant
Hemat Ranjbar a, b, *, Hamid Ahmadi a, Reza Khalighi Sheshdeh c, Hedyeh Ranjbar d
a
Department of Gas Engineering, Ahwaz Faculty of Petroleum Engineering, Petroleum University of Technology, Ahwaz, Iran
b
Iranian Central Oil Fields Company, Farashband Gas Refinery, Iran
c
Department of Chemical Engineering, College of Engineering, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran
d
Department of Chemical Engineering, Islamic Azad University of Marvdasht, Marvdasht, Iran

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Water removal from natural gas is an inevitable process in natural gas industry. Tri-Ethylene Glycol (TEG)
Received 16 February 2015 plant is the most common and economical process for the dehydration of natural gas. In this work, a
Received in revised form domestic TEG dehydration unit is simulated to determine the effect of various parameters on water
16 April 2015
content of the outlet dehydrated gas. The key feature of this work is the use of Relative Sensitivity
Accepted 17 April 2015
Available online
Function (RSF) to optimize the whole plant. RSF led into a reduction in the water content of dehydrated
gas, TEG circulation rate, and re-boiler duty. The final results revealed that relative sensitivity analysis is a
convincing method to determine the best operating conditions and to evaluate the effect of various
Keywords:
Relative sensitivity function
parameters on water content of the dried gas leaving the absorber column.
TEG dehydration unit © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Optimization

1. Introduction coefficients related to the equilibrium ratios of water in water-TEG-

Water vapor removal or dehydration process is an important
natural gas process for minimizing water content of natural gas to
an acceptable level. This is due to the fact that the presence of water
molecules can form clathrate hydrates leading to pipeline plugging
which is one of the most serious problems in the gas industry
(Rahimpour et al., 2013a; Wen et al., 2012). The processes which are
used for gas dehydration fall into five categories in principle: ab-
sorption with solvent, adsorption, gas permeation, refrigeration,
and ultrasonic separation (Gandhidasan et al., 2001; Lin et al., 2013;
Nemati Rouzbahani et al., 2014; Netusil and Ditl, 2011; Yang et al.,
2014a; Yang et al., 2014b). Among these methods, absorption is
the most commonly used process for natural gas dehydration and is
the most attractive one from an economic point of view (Isa et al.,
2013; Woodcock and Gottlieb, 2000). Today, most absorption
dehydration processes involve the use of glycol, more specifically
tri-ethylene glycol (TEG), as liquid desiccant to remove water
content from natural gas (Saidi et al., 2014).
The glycol dehydration process has been subjected to extensive
studies in the last decades. Scauzillo (1961) obtained the activity
* Corresponding author. Petroleum University of Technology, Ahwaz 61981-
44471, Iran.
E-mail address: ranjbar.hemat@gmail.coml (H. Ranjbar).
natural gas systems. Twu et al. (2005) developed an equation of
state to predict the thermodynamic behavior of water-glycol sys-
tems. Mostafazadeh et al. (2009) investigated the influence of
toluene on the VaporeLiquid Equilibria of Water e Triethylene
Glycol (TEG) systems. It has been recognized that a major issue with
the conventional TEG dehydration units is the emission of BTEX and
other volatile organic compounds (VOC) from the reboiler; there-
fore researchers have lengthily worked on the prevention of the
emissions of these compounds to the atmosphere (Hicks et al.,
2004; Peinemann and Stegger, 2003).
The present study utilizes the Relative Sensitivity Function to
optimize a dehydration unit through sensitivity analysis. The
employment of the Relative Sensitivity Function in this study
constitutes a novel practice since, to the best of the authors'
knowledge, it has not been exercised before. Conventionally, in
order to optimize industrial processing plants, most researchers
have tried to improve the performance of the underlying systems
by monitoring the variations in a target variable as other key pa-
rameters are changed from run to run. In 2001, Braek et al. tried to
optimize the process parameters of a glycol plant in order to
minimize BTEX/VOC emissions into the atmosphere (Braek et al.,
2001). In order to optimize that glycol system, they changed the
operating conditions of the system and showed the effect of those
changes on BTEX/VOC emissions. They therefore identified an

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jngse.2015.04.028
1875-5100/© 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
40 H. Ranjbar et al. / Journal of Natural Gas Science and Engineering 25 (2015) 39e45
optimum operating condition solely based on their observations of
the subsequent changes on BTEX/VOC emissions. A number of
similar research studies have been carried out for the sizing and
optimization of glycol dehydration plants. Ghiasi et al. (2015) uti-
lized two intelligent approaches, namely MLP neural network and
LSSVM algorithm, to introduce correlations for predicting optimum
stripping gas flow rate in natural gas dehydration systems.
Rahimpour et al. (2013b) changed some of the operating conditions
of Sarkhun gas processing plant and showed how these changing
would improve the performance of the plant. In this work, how-
ever, they have not explicitly explained how one must determine
the optimum operating conditions.
Mohamadbeigy (2008) investigated the effect of several pa-
rameters such as glycol flow rate on water content in glycol dehy-
dration units; among the considered parameters were glycol flow
rate, stripping gas rate and the number of stages in the absorber.
Chukwuma and Jacob (2014) conducted a similar study to simulate
the effect of such parameters on the water content of dried gas
leaving a typical glycol unit in Niger Delta. Nevertheless, none of
these studies considered a sensitivity analysis to compare the level
of influence from each individual parameter. Darwish and Hilal
(2008) investigated the effect of different input variables on the
amount of water content in the dry gas. They have presented their
work in the form of a sensitivity analysis; nevertheless, the analysis
makes only simplistic comparisons of different variables based on
the trends of their effects.
In spite of this great research focus on glycol dehydration plants,
there are still a handful of studies focusing on a specific gas dehy-
dration unit, i.e. Farashband Gas Refinery. Jokar et al. (2014)
investigated the feasibility of replacing the absorber trays with
structured packing of this glycol dehydration unit. Their results
showed that this replacement can reduce the dew point of the
outlet natural gas. Saidi et al. (2014) proposed that Drizo process
can mitigate BTEX emissions in the gas dehydration process.
Rahimpour and Jokar (2012) performed a practical work on the
flare gas of the same unit and concluded that the best method for
the recovery of the flare gas in the present situation is gas
compression. Nonetheless, these studies have not attempted at
improving the performance of the unit by optimizing its operating
conditions. Determining the optimum operating conditions has
therefore been highlighted in the present study and it is intended to
emphasize on the key role of the Relative Sensitivity Function in
this practice.
1.1. Objective
As a case study, the TEG dehydration unit of Farashband Gas
Refinery is simulated by using a steady-state flow sheet simulator.
The main objective of this research study is to determine the
relative sensitivity function of water content of the outlet dry gas
with respect to several key parameters in order to optimize the
present plant by means of the determined RSF through a sensitivity
analysis evaluation.
2. Sensitivity analysis
Sensitivity analysis is a powerful technique for validating engi-
neering models (Frank, 1978) and understanding their underlying
systems (Smith et al., 2008). It is an old and well known technique,
but to the best of the authors' knowledge, only a few recent studies
have considered it (William et al., 1993). In a sensitivity analysis,
one can practice changing several key input parameters whilst
evaluating the subsequent changes on any target outputs, i.e. pa-
rameters representing the performance of the system. The outcome
of such analysis will therefore help determining which parameters
(are most likely to) affect the system's behavior the most (Smith
et al., 2008).
Here, two different analytic sensitivity functions are briefly
explained. These functions have been determined based on the
partial derivative of a mathematical system model with respect to
several main parameters.
2.1. The absolute sensitivity function
The absolute sensitivity of function F to variations in parameter
a is given by (Smith et al., 2008):


vF


SFa ¼ (1)
va
NOP
in which NOP means the partial derivative of F is evaluated at the
Normal Operating Point (NOP) where all of the parameters have
their normal values. The absolute sensitivity shows the absolute
change of function F in relation to a change in parameter a (Paul
and Helmut, 2003). Absolute-sensitivity functions are useful for
assessing the points at which a parameter has its greatest or least
effect (Smith et al., 2008; William et al., 1993). It has units equal to
the ratio of the units of F to units of a. Therefore, it is not meaningful
to compare the absolute sensitivity values of different variables
with each other (Handbook, 1996).
2.2. The relative-sensitivity function
If it is desired to compare the effects of different parameters, one
should use relative-sensitivity functions (Smith et al., 2008). The
relative sensitivity of function F to parameter a, evaluated at the
normal operating point, is given by (Smith et al., 2008):


F vF

a0 % Change in F
Sa ¼ z (2)
va
NOP F0 % Change in a
where NOP and the subscripts 0 an that the functions and param-
eters assume their normal operating point values. The relative
sensitivity function is dimensionless. Thus, in a multi-factor system,
it can be used to compare the relative influence of different pa-
rameters (Handbook, 1996).
3. Process description
A simplified schematic diagram of a conventional TEG dehy-
dration unit is shown in Fig. 1. As illustrated in this figure, wet gas
enters the absorption tower from the bottom and lean glycol from
the top of the tower. Within the absorber, the water in the gas
phase is absorbed by glycol so that rich glycol and dry gas streams
exit from the bottom and top of the tower, respectively. Later, the
rich glycol flows into a reflux condenser at the top of the still col-
umn; after which it enters a flash tank where most of its volatile
components are vaporized. Leaving the flash tank, the rich glycol
flows through glycol filters and passes through a rich-lean
exchanger to exchange heat with a stream of hot lean glycol. The
rich glycol then enters the still column so that its water is removed
by distillation (Campbell, 1976). After distillation, the remaining
glycol is hot and lean so it is cooled by flowing across the rich-lean
exchanger. The lean glycol is then fed into a pump where its
pressure is elevated to that of the glycol contactor and is subse-
quently fed back into the contactor after getting cooled with an air
cooler.
 H. Ranjbar et al. / Journal of Natural Gas Science and Engineering 25 (2015) 39e45 41

Fig. 1. A schematic diagram of a conventional TEG dehydration unit.

4. Determination of the affecting parameters we consider the water content of the outlet dry gas stream to be
representative of the overall performance of the unit and so we
The main goal of any TEG dehydration plant is to reduce the evaluate its sensitivity to different parameters in order to deter-
water content of its wet gas to a certain acceptable level. Thus, here mine the optimum operating condition of the unit.

Fig. 2. The HYSYS model of the domestic TEG unit.

42 H. Ranjbar et al. / Journal of Natural Gas Science and Engineering 25 (2015) 39e45

Table 1
Stream specifications of the domestic TEG unit.

Wet Gas Lean TEG Stripping Gas Rich TEG Dry Gas

Simulation data Plant data Simulation data Plant data Simulation data Plant data Simulation data Plant data Simulation data Plant data

Temp. ( C) 50 50 57 57 40 40 47 48 45.6 47
Press. (bar) 115 115 110 110 1.2 1.2 105 102 100 96
Flow rate 230.2 MMSCFD ~230 MMSCFD 5200 kg/hr ~5200 kg/hr 34 m3/hr 3
~34 m /hr 3488 kg/hr Not Available 230 MMSCFD Not Available

N2 0.10mole% 0.00mass% 100.0mole% 0.00mass% 0.10mole%

H2S 1.55mole% 0.00mass% 0.00mole% 0.37mass% 1.55mole%
CO2 2.84mole% 0.00mass% 0.00mole% 0.11mass% 2.84mole%
C1 89.76mole% 0.00mass% 0.00mole% 0.12mass% 89.88mole%
C2 3.10mole% 0.00mass% 0.00mole% 0.01mass% 3.10mole%
C3 1.48mole% 0.00mass% 0.00mole% 0.03mass% 1.48mole%
iC4 0.59mole% 0.00mass% 0.00mole% 0.00mass% 0.59mole%
nC4 0.30mole% 0.00mass% 0.00mole% 0.01mass% 0.30mole%
iC5 0.10mole% 0.00mass% 0.00mole% 0.00mass% 0.10mole%
nC5 0.05mole% 0.00mass% 0.00mole% 0.00mass% 0.05mole%
H2O 0.14mole% 1.14mass% 0.00mole% 6.07mass% 0.01mole%
TEG 0.00mole% 98.86mass% 0.00mole% 93.27mass% 0.00mole%

The Kremser equation is useful in the preliminary design of 5. Results and discussion
plate columns for dehydration of natural gas with glycol solutions
(Kohl and Nielsen, 1997). According to the Kremser equation, the The Kremser equation assumes that the VaporeLiquid equilib-
basic absorption equation is (Sharma, 2007): rium K-values are linear and the absorption factor to be constant
over all trays (Rousseau, 1987). Thus, it isn't recommended to use
this equation for a more accurate calculation (Kohl and Nielsen,
yin  yout ANþ1  A 1997). However, the parameters influencing the outlet water
¼ Nþ1 (3)
yin  Kxin A 1

where:

yin ¼ mole fraction of water in the inlet wet gas

yout ¼ mole fraction of water in the outlet dried gas
xin ¼ mole fraction of water in the lean TEG
K ¼ equilibrium constant of water
N ¼ number of theoretical trays
A ¼ L=KV ¼ absorption factor
L ¼ glycol circulation rate
V ¼ gas flow rate

By rearranging Eq. (3), one gets:

" #
ANþ1  A
yout ¼ yin  ðyin  Kxin Þ Nþ1 (4)
A 1

Since water content of natural gas has a leading role in gas

transmission pipelines, yout can be converted to water
content, Wout, by a simple stoichiometry. Thus the parameters
affecting the outlet water content are: mole fraction of water in the
inlet wet gas, mole fraction of water in the lean TEG, glycol circu-
lation rate, gas flow rate, equilibrium constant of water, which is a
function of temperature and Pressure (Smith, 2005).

Table 2
Data of the absorber and still columns.

Vessel Data

Absorber column Pressure: 100 bar

No. of actual trays: 15
No. of ideal trays: 5
Tray type: Valve
Still column Packing type: Raschig ring packing height: 4 m
Packing size: 2 in
Pressure: 1.01 bar
Condenser temperature: 108  C
Fig. 3. The effect of glycol circulation rate on the water content of dried gas leaving the
Reboiler temperature: 194  C
absorber.
 H. Ranjbar et al. / Journal of Natural Gas Science and Engineering 25 (2015) 39e45 43

Table 3
Wout
Sample calculations for determining numerical differentiation ðw0out Þi , and relative sensitivity, SL ; of each data point.
Wout
i Glycol rate ðkg=hrÞ Water content of outlet gas ðmg=std m3 gasÞ ðw0out Þi ¼ 1h ½Dðwout Þi  1=2D2 ðwout Þi þ 1=3D3 ðwout Þi  1=4D4 ðwout Þi  SL ¼ ðw0out Þi  Li =ðwout Þi

h ¼ Liþ1  Li ¼ 100
Dn ðwout Þi ¼ Dn1 ðwout Þiþ1  Dn1 ðwout Þi

Li ðwout Þi Dðwout Þi D2 ðwout Þi D3 ðwout Þi D4 ðwout Þi ðw0out Þi

1 100 585.23 121.09 40.73 19.66 12.09 1.51 0.26

2 200 464.14 80.36 21.07 7.58 3.60 0.94 0.41
3 300 383.78 59.29 13.49 3.98 1.60 0.68 0.53
4 400 324.48 45.80 9.51 2.38 0.51 0.51 0.63
5 500 278.68 36.29 7.14 1.87 / / /
6 600 242.39 29.15 5.27 / /
7 700 213.24 23.89 / /
8 800 189.35 / /
9 / / /

content are the same as those obtained from the Kremser equation. b) In region (I), where the glycol rate is less than 1000 kg/hr, the
Therefore, to determine the effect of these parameters, the present sensitivity of the outlet water content to the rate of glycol
study utilizes a steady-state flow sheet simulator, namely HYSYS. A increases by increasing the glycol rate (see Fig. 3b in region
schematic diagram of the simulation model is shown in Fig. 2. In (I)). However, at a glycol rate of 1000 kg/hr, where sensitivity
order to calibrate the simulation model, the base case input data is the highest, the water content of the dried gas has not
were employed to the model. The main specifications of the decreased enough yet (Fig. 3a).
considered operating conditions are provided through Tables 1 and c) In region (II), where the glycol rate is between 1000 to
2 along with actual measured data from different operating con- 4000 kg/hr, the sensitivity of the outlet water content to the
ditions at the plant. As these two tables indicate, the actual rate of glycol decreases by increasing the glycol rate. In
measured data of the process is rather close to the simulation data,
which confirms the predictive capability of the simulation model.
For extra validation of the simulation model, the water content of
the output dried gas was determined and found to be 66.23mg/
std m3gas, which is close to the experimental data of 73mg/
std m3gas.
Among the parameters mentioned in the previous section, the
flow rate of the wet gas is fixed at the studied unit and therefore is
not changed during this optimization practice. In addition, the ef-
fect of lean TEG concentration has previously been studied exten-
sively in the literature (Ghiasi et al., 2015; Isa et al., 2013; Nemati
Rouzbahani et al., 2014); therefore it is not considered here.
Hence, the parameters that are changed during the present opti-
mization practice only include glycol circulation rate and temper-
ature of the absorber (or inlet wet gas temperature), which are
discussed below.

5.1. The effect of glycol circulation rate

In order to minimize the water content of the outlet dried gas,

the glycol circulation rate needs to be increased. However,
increasing the TEG circulation rate will increase the operating costs
and the hydrocarbon losses (Campbell, 1976); thus the minimum
feasible rate for glycol circulation is considered an important factor
in the optimization of the absorption column. Fig. 3a shows the
effect of TEG circulation rate on the water content of the dried gas.
The numerical differentiation of the data points of Fig. 3a has been
obtained by the forth-order Newton forward-difference polynomial
approach (Gerald and Wheatley, 2004; Hoffman and Frankel, 2001).
Subsequently, the relative sensitivity of the outlet water content to
Wout
the circulation rate of glycol, ðSL Þ; has been determined ac-
cording to Eq. (2). An example of this computation procedure has
been shown in Table 3, and its results have been presented
graphically in Fig. 3b The following conclusions can be made based
on Fig. 3a and b:
Wout
a) The negative sign of SL means that increasing the glycol
rate would decrease the water content, which is also Fig. 4. The effect of the temperature of the inlet wet gas on the water content of the
apparent in Fig. 3a. dried gas leaving the absorber.
44 H. Ranjbar et al. / Journal of Natural Gas Science and Engineering 25 (2015) 39e45
Table 4
Final optimization results.
Optimized parameters TEG rate (kg/hr)
Inlet wet gas temperature (K)
Output results Dry gas water content ðmg=std m3 gasÞ
Re-boiler Duty (kW)
addition, the water content is still decreasing by increasing
glycol rate.
d) In region (III), where the glycol rate is greater than 4000 kg/
hr, the sensitivity of the outlet water content to the rate of
glycol approaches zero. This means that any further increase
in the glycol rate would be unable to affect the water content
of the dried gas significantly.
Overall, it can be concluded that a glycol rate of about 4000 kg/
hr is an ideal choice for this plant. This is because below this value,
the water content has not decreased enough yet (Fig. 3a), and above
this value, the sensitivity of the water content to the rate of glycol
becomes negligible (Fig. 3b).
5.2. The effect of wet gas temperature
As it has been recognized previously, the lower the temperature
of the absorber (which is controlled by the inlet wet gas temper-
ature), the better glycol can absorb water from the inlet natural wet
gas (Bahadori and Vuthaluru, 2009; Bestani and Shing, 1989;
Gandhidasan, 2003). Fig. 4a illustrates how decreasing the tem-
perature of wet gas decreases the water content of the outlet dried
gas.
It must be noted regarding the determination of the data of
Fig. 4a that the wet gas cooling has been accounted for via imple-
mentation of a heat exchanger before the wet gas enters the inlet
slug catcher, so that the liquid formed through the cooling process
could be removed from the gas in the slug catcher before it enters
the absorber. Secondly, it must be noted that the temperature of the
lean TEG stream has been set to be 7  C higher than the tempera-
ture of the wet gas stream by the SET operation of the simulator, i.e.
when the temperature of wet gas is, for example, 300 K or 310 K,
the temperature of lean TEG will be adjusted to be 307 K or 317 K,
respectively.
The relative sensitivity of the water content of the outlet dried
Wout
gas to the temperature of the inlet wet gas ðST Þ is depicted in
Fig. 4b (the calculations are similar to those shown in Table 3). This
figure reveals that the water content is more sensitive to the
changes in the temperature of the inlet wet gas at higher temper-
atures; whereas at lower temperatures, the water content is at a
relatively low value and its sensitivity to the changes in the tem-
perature of the inlet wet gas reduces to almost half its amount at
higher temperatures. However, since the slope of the sensitivity
graph is almost constant, one cannot easily specify a low temper-
ature below which the sensitivity function approaches zero, thus
other criteria should be taken into account in determining suitable
low temperature for the inlet wet gas. As an example, one criterion
that should be considered is the hydrate formation temperature of
the wet gas. Reducing the temperature of the wet gas below its
hydrate formation temperature will cause the formation of clath-
rates within the heat exchanger or the slug catcher that are
installed before the absorption column; therefore, for the present
plant, we suggest that the temperature of the inlet wet gas to be
reduced to as low as 300 K which is a few degrees higher than the
hydrate formation temperature of the wet gas (i.e.294 k., deter-
mined using the simulator) in order to ensure both operational
Before optimization After optimization
5200 4000
323 300
66.23 16.55
446 268
safety and optimum performance.
Another important criterion is the cost required to cool the wet
gas before it enters the slug catchers and the absorber. Conven-
tionally, there is a unit in operation after the TEG dehydration unit
to adjust the hydrocarbon dew point of the dried gas leaving the
TEG dehydration unit by a Joule-Thomson expander. The gas leav-
ing the expander is normally cooled to below zero degrees Celsius,
and thus this cold stream can be recycled back and used as coolant
to reduce the temperature of the wet gas entering the TEG dehy-
dration unit. This will probably reduce the high cost of gas cooling
process.
5.3. Final optimization results
After implementing the above optimized parameters in the
HYSIS simulation model, the performance of the TEG dehydration
plant improved noticeably. Table 4 shows the performance of the
plant before and after optimization. It is clear from Table 4 that
through sensitivity analysis and optimization of the process:
a) The TEG circulation rate has decreased.
b) The duty of the reboiler has decreased due to the reduction in
the TEG circulation rate.
c) More importantly, the water content of the dry gas has
decreased remarkably.
6. Conclusion
A typical tri-ethylene glycol dehydration unit was selected as a
case study to determine the sensitivity of the water content of its
outlet dry gas to several influential parameters; and the usefulness
of the Relative Sensitivity Function was illustrated. The whole unit
was simulated by a steady-state flow-sheet simulator, i.e. HYSIS.
First, the effect of the glycol circulation rate and the absorber's
temperature on the dehydrated gas water content was determined.
Subsequently, the relative sensitivity function of the water content
of the outlet dried gas to these two parameters was evaluated. The
obtained relative sensitivities were then used to determine the
optimum value for these effective parameters. To study the possi-
bility of optimizing the entire process, all of the optimized pa-
rameters were then implemented in a simulation model. The final
results showed that the relative sensitivity analysis is a very
effective methodology to consider when one aims to minimize the
re-boiler's duty, glycol circulation rate and, more importantly, the
water content of the dehydrated gas.
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