Computational fluid dynamics-based study on the heavy crude oil-water  emulsion flow through sudden expansion, contraction and 90° bend

Arun Jana; Girish D. Vegad

doi:10.15282/jmes.18.2.2024.1.0788

Authors

A. K. Jana Department of Chemical Engineering, Sardar Vallabhbhai National Institute of Technology, Surat-395 007, Gujarat, India. Phone: +91-261-2201650, Fax.: +91-261-2227334
G. D. Vegad Department of Chemical Engineering, Sardar Vallabhbhai National Institute of Technology, Surat-395 007, Gujarat, India

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15282/jmes.18.2.2024.1.0788

Keywords:

Sudden expansion, Sudden contraction, 90° bend O/W emulsion, Loss coefficient, Pressure drop

Abstract

Oil-in-water emulsion (O/W) can be prepared to transport heavy crude oil (HCO) through a pipeline effectively with reduced viscosity and pumping power. Various pipe fittings such as bend, elbow, sudden contraction, sudden expansion of pipe etc., are sometimes essential in the design of such pipelines. Energy losses take place due to skin and form friction during pipe flow. The determination of friction loss, which results in pressure losses, in pipes and fittings is crucial for the proper estimation of pumping power required for pipeline transport of the emulsions. The present study represents a numerical simulation of the emulsion flow through sudden expansion, contraction and 90° bend in the pipeline using a mixture model considering the prepared emulsion as a pseudo-homogeneous liquid. O/W emulsion was prepared at the optimum conditions of viscosity and stability with 25 %v/v water, 75 %v/v HCO and 4.5 % w/vsurfactant PS-81. The effect of parameters like average mixture velocity on pressure drop and pressure loss coefficient for various pipe fittings has been studied as laminar flow using ANSYS Fluent 2019 R3. The estimated value of the loss coefficient for the expansion, Ke, is 0.2313, and the loss coefficient for the contraction, K_c, is 3. Higher values of loss coefficient for contraction are due to higher pressure drop. For a 90° bend, as the average mixture velocity, and hence Reynolds number, increases, the pressure loss coefficient decreases. Within the range of velocity considered in the present study, an increase in pressure drop has been observed for sudden contraction, whereas a slight rise in pressure drop was found for sudden expansion. A nearly linear increase in pressure drop has been observed for a 90° bend. Pressure loss data caused by such pipe fittings are helpful in predicting additional pressure drops caused by them and, hence, an increase in pumping cost.

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