Abstract
Abstract Transportation of natural gas from gathering station to consumption centers is done through complex gas pipeline network system. The huge cost involved in transporting natural gas has made pipeline optimization of increased interest in natural gas pipeline industries. In the present work a lesser known application of Ant Colony in pipeline optimization, has been implemented in a real gas pipeline network. The objective chosen is to minimize the fuel consumption in a gas pipeline network consisting of seven compressors. Pressures at forty-five nodes are chosen as the decision variables. Results of Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) have been compared with those of GAMS that utilizes ‘Generalized gradient principles’ for optimization. Our results utilizing ACO show significant improvement in fuel consumption reductions. Similar procedures can be adopted by researchers and pipeline managers to help pipeline operators in fixing up the pressures at different nodes so as the fuel consumption in compressors gets minimized.
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