Storage and Transportation of Natural Gas at Moderate Pressures using Adsorption in Porous Materials

Abstract

This reference is for an abstract only. A full paper was not submitted for this conference. Abstract The use of vessels filled with porous materials to store and transport natural gas at moderate pressures (about 3.5 MPa) and ambient temperature (about 298 K) has been studied as a potential alternative to compressed natural gas storage at high pressures (ca. 20 MPa). The present study provides an experimental investigation of charge and discharge cycles of natural gas in a prototype storage vessel filled with activated carbon and analyses the effect of the gas composition on the adsorption capacity. The adsorption properties were evaluated by measuring isotherms for each component of natural gas in a magnetic suspension balance and compared with the isotherms measured in a storage vessel using natural gas. The selectivities of the main constituents of natural gas in relation to methane were determined and the influence of the pressure on the selectivity was also observed. Although natural gas is composed mainly of methane (ca. 90% vol.), our experimental results indicate that the preferential adsorption of the heavier hydrocarbons and CO2 should be properly taken into account for the evaluation of the behavior of adsorbed natural gas systems along several charge and discharge cycles.