A new model for the accurate calculation of natural gas viscosity

Abstract

Viscosity of natural gas is a basic and important parameter, of theoretical and practical significance in the domain of natural gas recovery, transmission and processing. In order to obtain the accurate viscosity data efficiently at a low cost, a new model and its corresponding functional relation are derived on the basis of the relationship among viscosity, temperature and density derived from the kinetic theory of gases. After the model parameters were optimized using a lot of experimental data, the diagram showing the variation of viscosity along with temperature and density is prepared, showing that: ① the gas viscosity increases with the increase of density as well as the increase of temperature in the low density region; ② the gas viscosity increases with the decrease of temperature in high density region. With this new model, the viscosity of 9 natural gas samples was calculated precisely. The average relative deviation between these calculated values and 1539 experimental data measured at 250–450 K and 0.10–140.0 MPa is less than 1.9%. Compared with the 793 experimental data with a measurement error less than 0.5%, the maximum relative deviation is less than 0.98%. It is concluded that this new model is more advantageous than the previous 8 models in terms of simplicity, accuracy, fast calculation, and direct applicability to the CO2 bearing gas samples.