Abstract
Natural companies employ turbine flow meters to measure natural gas which delivered to Compressed Natural Gas stations. The stations utilize compressors to increase pressure. The compressor produces a flow pulsation, which affects the accuracy of the measurement. The main aim of this article is to decrease the compressor effects on measurement accuracy by utilizing a snubber between the turbine flow meter and the reciprocating compressors. For this aim, numerical modeling has been built to simulate natural gas flow through a snubber. The effects of various snubber parameters on pressure pulsation have been investigated. The parameters included snubber volume to the minimum volume ratio, the ratio of height to diameter, outlet pipe length, and the existence and non-existence a buffer. The Ansys Fluent has been used for numerical modeling with transient analysis. Results show that in H/D value of 3, the maximum reduction in the percentage of pressure pulsation drop is about 47% and increasing the outlet pipe length to the 10 times of initial length causes a decrease of about 83% in pressure pulsations. Besides, for the ratio of snubber volume to the minimum volume from 1 to 16.7, the amplitude of pressure pulsations decreases from 4.1% to 0.25%.
Highlights
The utilization of NG (Natural Gas) as a fuel for vehicles has been underway for decades
API standard 618 describes a relationship for the minimum volume of a snubber, while it does not express a relationship for the ratio of height to diameter of the cylinder
One of the effective parameters in determining the optimum design of the snubber is the ratio of height to diameter of the cylinder (H/D)
Summary
The utilization of NG (Natural Gas) as a fuel for vehicles has been underway for decades. CNG technology has been developed and applied for decades and is becoming an established applicable technology. With ever growing concerns about environmental pollution, the high cost of petroleum fuels, the low cost of natural gas compared to conventional fuels and the low cost of the process for preparing natural gas for industrial application have led to a strong desire for different countries to use natural gas as a fuel for automobiles. Development of CNG stations will facilitate the usage of Natural Gas and will lead to lower environmental pollution. The most important component of a CNG station is a reciprocating compressor. The largest share of the current and initial costs of the stations depends on the reciprocating compressor (Farzaneh-Gord, Niazmand, Deymi-Dashtebayaz, & Rahbari, 2015)
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