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Large capacity LNG trains: focus on improving plant operability during the design stage.

Author(s) : WILKES M., VALAPPIL J., MEHROTRA V., et al.

Summary

The rapid growth in natural gas demand has posed unique technical challenges for the LNG industry. There is a significant push towards designing and building larger capacity LNG trains (5 MTPA or higher). This shift to larger trains requires unique compressor driver and process configuration modifications to reduce capital cost. The operability of these LNG plant designs needs to be analyzed and validated using dynamic simulation. Any potential trade-off between operability and plant capacity has to be understood and accounted for during the design stage. This paper discusses the technical issues encountered by the design team in studying the operability and controllability of a selected compressor driver configuration using dynamic simulation. The LNG plant scheme under consideration used an unconventional driver configuration new to the design. The gas turbine drivers selected were of limited operating range. This, along with the process changes resulted in very different operating philosophy for the plant. The operability of this plant design for various transient scenarios was studied with simulation. Plant wide control strategies were modified to account for the process modifications and the new driver configuration. Alternate control strategies were introduced such as anti-bog control scheme and novel operating/start-up procedures were developed to reduce operator intervention. This paper presents the strategies employed by the team during the design stage to ensure that the increase in LNG train size does not come at the expense of plant reliability and availability.

Details

  • Original title: Large capacity LNG trains: focus on improving plant operability during the design stage.
  • Record ID : 2008-1114
  • Languages: English
  • Source: LNG 15. Proceedings of the 15th International Conference and Exhibition of Liquefied Natural Gas.
  • Publication date: 2007/04/24

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