The use of axial cyclone separator in the separation of wax from natural gas: A theoretical approach

Abstract

The waxy component in natural gas may bring about some challenges in the treatment and transportation processes, especially in the cryogenic separation process. An axial flow cyclone separator was applied to separate wax from natural gas. An Eulerian–Lagrangian approach combined with the Reynolds stress model (RSM) was adopted to investigate the flow of gas and wax droplets in the separator. The distributions of static pressure as well as tangential, axial, and radial velocity were presented to describe the flow field in the cyclone separator. The results suggested that the established model could be used to simulate the separation process in the cyclone efficiently. Most importantly, the simulation was conducted under various inlet velocities and mass content of waxy component to study the effects of the operation parameters on separation efficiency. It was indicated that the inlet velocity has a great impact on the separation efficiency when it is greater than 15 m/s. The effect of mass content of waxy component is significant when it is smaller than 172.4 kg/m3, especially for small sized wax droplets. It is believed that the separation efficiency in the proposed axial flow cyclone is as high as 95% with suitable operational conditions.