Platform Waste Gas Combustion: Efficiently, Safely, Reliably and Economically

Abstract

Abstract The combustion of waste gas, or gas that cannot be processed economically, has attracted considerable global attention. Recently, the World Bank has been focused on viable alternatives to the practice of flaring and venting. And, since 24 billion cubic feet are flared and vented daily from oil and gas operations, the reasons are clear. Over 9,000 trillion BTU of energy and 1.4 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide are released into the atmosphere each year. These are significant contributors to global climate change, potentially harmful emissions and energy waste. But waste gas combustion is conducted in a responsible manner as there have been significant technological improvements over flaring or less efficient technologies. Safety is of paramount importance with respect to the design and operation of offshore platforms and here the combustion of waste gases must be carried out with the highest consideration for the protection of human health and safety. The most environmentally and conservation conscious option is to capture these gases for further processing, should that be practical. The recovery and transportation of waste and fugitive gases from offshore operations, however, is both challenging and costly which has resulted in the traditional flaring of these streams. If combustion is deemed most appropriate, the selection of the combustion process can result in very diverse emissions. An example of this is the incineration of tail gas. This yielded an annual fuel savings of over $2MM. The annual reduction of over 73,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent creates a value stream of over $1.1 MM. This is due to the more efficient combustion and the 60% in fuel utilization. Maximizing safety and minimizing GHG and other pollutants and harmful emissions is attributable to high combustion efficiency. While combustion efficiency is a vital part of the overall performance the other critical parameter is reliability. High efficiency and reliability is a result of controlling the environment in which combustion occurs, within the proper operating range and design conditions, while ensuring that all process components have been designed to function prolifically in the marine environment.