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Experimental Investigation into Liquid and Solid Separation by an Industrial Mesh-Vane Type Separator on Natural Gas at 4 to 5 MPa, Different Liquid Loadings and Gas Flows


 Inline vertical separators are commonly employed on natural gas transmission facilities (e.g., receipt stations) to filter liquid contaminants such as compressor oil, glycol, free water, etc. from the gas stream. Manufacturers of these separators have claimed liquid removal efficiencies of 98-99% for droplet sizes ≥ 8 μm. However, these contaminants have been found invariably in piping systems downstream of these separators, suggesting inadequate separator performance. Currently, there is a lack of ability to verify manufacturer claims due to difficulties in quantifying liquid contaminants and droplet characteristics. The potential consequences of having such contaminants includes lower gas quality, impaired gas metering accuracy, corrosion and damage to equipment/instrumentation and adverse impacts on industrial and residential end users. This paper presents performance testing of a mesh-vane type vertical separator conducted on high pressure, pipeline quality, natural gas in the range of 4-5 MPa and flow velocity in the range of 1.3-13 m/s in the DN150 separator inlet (hence turndown ratio of 10:1). Four different spray nozzles were used to inject and atomize industrial compressor oil with a liquid-to-gas mass loading ratio of 0.06-1.8%. Test results revealed that the average bulk efficiency separation performance for this separator is approximately 90.34%. This was found to be independent of liquid-to-gas mass loading ratio. The effective Souders-Brown K factor was found to be 0.15 m/s. This is below literature published data in the range of 0.27 to 0.3 m/s for horizontal flow, vane pack type, separators. Liquid separation tests were also conducted following injection of solid glass beads. Liquid separation efficiency decreased by approximately 9%, following the injection of 7 kg of industrial glass beads over a period of approximately 4 hours. This was attributed to accumulation of solids in the vane-pack.