CHEM ENG 4014: Plant Design Project

DESIGN PROJECT SPECIFICATION - SMALL GAS PROCESSING FACILITY

Project No 4-2019 Project Sponsor: Nigel Walker

SMALL GAS PROCESSING FACILITY

1. Project Background
The Otway Basin on the south coast of Australia extends from Cape Jaffa in South Australia to north-
west Tasmania. A small oil & gas exploration company, Rainbow Limited, has successfully drilled and
completed a commercial gas well Jackpot-1 in this basin near Penola in South Australia.
It now requires facilities to process raw gas and hydrocarbon liquids from Jackpot-1 to sell to the open
market. Processed gas will be sold to Epic Energy by connection to its South-East Pipeline System
(SEPS). Liquid hydrocarbons will be sold to plants operated by Santos at Port Bonython, South
Australia, or Viva Energy at Geelong, Victoria.

2. Design Project Scope

The scope of this project is to design a small processing facility near the town of Penola, South Australia
to treat the raw gas from Jackpot-1 to the required specifications for sale to Epic Energy and collection
and sale of liquid hydrocarbons to either Santos or Viva Energy by road transport.
The plant will consist of the following units and associated facilities.
• Inlet Slug-Catcher, gas-liquid separation;
• Water and hydrocarbon dew point control units;
• Sales Gas custody transfer metering;
• Gas Condensate storage, metering and truck loadout facilities;
• Produced Water storage and evaporation facility;
• Relief and flare system;
• Open and closed drains;
• Required utilities;
• Operator Control Room, Maintenance Workshop and Chemical Storage.

3. Design Assumptions

3.1. Flowline
Design of wellhead facilities and the flowline from Jackpot-1 to the plant is not part of the design
scope. The following information is provided to assist with design of the gas plant inlet facilities:
3.1.1 Equipment installed at the wellhead includes flowline pressure control and pressure relief in
accordance with AS 2885.1 Clause 7.2 plus corrosion inhibitor injection and pigging facilities.

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DESIGN PROJECT SPECIFICATION - SMALL GAS PROCESSING FACILITY

3.1.2 The flowline length is 6 km and there is no elevation change between flowline inlet and outlet.
3.1.3 The flowline is buried to a depth of 1m below surface, measured from the top of the pipe.
3.1.4 The flowline design conditions are 9.28 MPag and 100°C, with a 1.5 mm corrosion allowance.
3.1.5 The pipe material is API 5L X56 with a design yield strength of 56000 psi or 386 MPa.
3.1.6 The pipe coating is Fusion-Bonded Epoxy (FBE) with an average thickness of 0.5 mm.
3.1.7 The design ground temperature at the pipeline buried depth is 20°C.

3.2. Full Well Stream Information

FWS
Mass Flow (kg/h) 13,500
Component (kg/h) Mol Fraction
H2O 1500.0 0.1390
Nitrogen 72.5 0.0043
CO2 365.0 0.0138
Methane 6885.0 0.7163
Ethane 775.0 0.0430
Propane 685.0 0.0259
i-Butane 150.0 0.0043
n-Butane 300.0 0.0086
i-Pentane 74.5 0.0017
n-Pentane 110.0 0.0025
n-Hexane 440.0 0.0085
n-Heptane 1030.0 0.0172
n-Octane 500.0 0.0073
n-Nonane 300.0 0.0039
n-Decane 183.0 0.0021
n-C11 80.0 0.0009
n-C12 50.0 0.0005
A gas standard m3 is measured at 15°C and 101.325 kPa (a), and 23.645 standard m3 of gas contains 1
kmol of gas.

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DESIGN PROJECT SPECIFICATION - SMALL GAS PROCESSING FACILITY

Contaminants such as radioactive materials, mercury, hydrogen sulphide and mercaptans are not detected
in the wellhead gas.

3.3. Slug-Catcher and Inlet Gas-Liquid Separation

Multiphase fluid from the flowline will arrive at the gas plant at a pressure of 7,500 kPag and 65 deg C.
Flowline conditions may reach 8,350 kPag and 20 deg C after prolonged shut-in.
Facilities must accommodate a liquid slug of 2 m3 and a liquid slugging rate of 3 times steady-state.
Fluids from the flowline will contain corrosion inhibitor and potentially sand produced from the well.

3.4. Water and Hydrocarbon Dew Point Control Units

Specifications for water content and hydrocarbon dew points are as follows.
Water content 65 mg/(standard m3 dry gas)
Hydrocarbon dew point 2°C at 3500 kPag
Possible technologies for the control of water and hydrocarbon dew points are listed below.
• Low-Temperature Separation together with the use of methanol or glycol;
• Physical adsorbents such as silica gel, molecular sieve, calcium chloride;
• Other novel technologies, e.g. Twister technology

3.5. Gas Export

Sales gas custody metering is required. Sales gas must be delivered to the SEPS at a minimum pressure
of 5500 kPag and a minimum temperature of 20°C and a maximum temperature of 65°C and meet the
specifications in AS 4564.

3.6. Gas Condensate Storage and Truck Loadout

Storage tanks built to AS 1940 shall be provided to store at least 10 days of gas condensate production.
Gas condensate shall be loaded onto trucks with a maximum capacity of 40 m3 and maximum loading
time should be 30 minutes.

3.7. Produced Water Storage and Evaporation Facility

Produced Water shall be stored either in an open top storage tank or pond with a minimum working depth
of 1.5 m. Water will be disposed of via evaporation to atmosphere. The design pan evaporation rate
shall be 2 m/y.

3.8. Relief and Flare System

All vapour or 2-phase effluents shall be disposed of via a flare. Flare type and positioning shall consider
the risk of accidental generation of bush fires in summer.

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3.9. Open and Closed Drains

Drainage of liquid effluents shall be directed to an underground sump for disposal via truck to a third-
party water treatment contractor such as Veolia.

3.10. Required Utilities

• Electricity supply may be assumed to be available from the existing power supply grid;
• Fuel gas supply shall be sourced from the plant itself;
• Steam supply if used shall be generated on-site.

3.11. Control Room and Workshops

A single building shall be provided to house the Main Control Room and Motor Control Centre. Separate
buildings shall be provided to serve as Maintenance Workshop and Chemical Storage.

4. Plant Location
The plant shall be assumed to be built on available land within 5 km of Penola. Civil construction scope
is restricted to the units required for the project.

5. Plant Availability and Design Life

Required design life is 20 years with plant availability of 355 days per year.

6. Economic Analysis
For the purpose of economic analysis for the project, the following assumptions shall be used.
• Method of analysis is Discounted Cash Flow over the project life of 20 years;
• Inflation rate is 2.5% per annum;
• Material and labour costs increase at 2.5% per annum;
• Gas price is $5/GJ and increases at 2% per annum;
• Condensate price is A$500/m3 and increases at 2% per annum;
• The discount factors to be used for assessment are 10%, 12.5% and 15%.

7. References
• Coulson & Richardson’s Chemical Engineering, “Chemical Engineering Design”, Vol 6
• GPSA Engineering Data Book
• John M Campbell “Gas Conditioning and Processing”
Note that the above list of references is not exhaustive.

Project Sponsor: Nigel Walker

Rev 1 23/7/2019

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