Design and Optimization of Glycol-Based Natural Gas Dehydration Plant

Abstract

Natural gas dehydration by Triethylene Glycol (TEG) is local content driven and highly imperative as it can reduce the water content of natural gas sufficiently in pipeline transmission and distribution standards. In the past, several research studies have proved that water vapour in natural gas causes the formation of hydrates, cakes, sludge, corrosion, and other flow issues. Hence, the design and optimization of glycol-based natural gas dehydration plants are important aspects of process engineering research. The TEG dehydration plant was designed using the advanced process simulation tool Aspen HYSYS to get different water content values in natural gas by varying the feed operating condition (temperature, pressure and flow rate) at a constant contactor pressure of 60 bar. The models relating the process feed conditions and the water content of sales gas were developed using Microsoft Excel (Solver), which was optimized using differential calculus to get optimum feed gas conditions of 22.320C and 89.08bar of temperature and pressure, respectively, with a water content of 0.0113kg H2O/m3 of Natural gas.