Year of Successful Operation of First Russian Associated Petroleum Gas Treatment Plant

A year ago, the Russian scientific and production company GRASYS successfully brought on stream the innovative associated petroleum gas (APG) treatment plant for gas delivery to the Gazprom OJSC gas transmission system.

The plant is based on the company in-house CarboPEEK nano membrane and able to fully resolve the issue of APG disposal at the Novoukrainskaya Compressor Station of RN-Krasnodarneftegaz OJSC, a subsidiary of NK-Rosneft OJSC.

Currently, the APG treatment plant of GRASYS CJSC intended for treatment of a relatively small volume of hydrogen-bearing APG (13 m cu. m/year) has been successfully operating for one year with the outlet gas parameters complying with OST51.40–93, which is the condition precedent to gas delivery to the Gazprom OJSC gas transmission system.

GRASYS CarboPEEK Based Associated Petroleum Gas Treatment Plant at Novoukrainskaya CS

In order to resolve this issue GRASYS suggested a unique proprietary complex solution including simultaneous drying of associated petroleum gas with removal of hydrocarbons and moisture and recovery of hydrocarbon sulfide and mercaptans up to the rated residual concentrations. The solution suggested allows 100% field disposal of associated petroleum gas.

APG outlet parameters (Novoukrainskaya CS) ensured by the GRASYS plant:

Worth noting is the fact that for this CS the solution of the APG treatment problem using any other means would be economically inefficient.

The CarboPEEK membrane technology allows resolving the APG treatment tasks with lower capital and operating expenditures as compared with conventional technologies. The suggested technology is unrivaled in situations where it is necessary to simultaneously remove a number of harmful components (water, carbon dioxide, hydrogen sulfide, mercaptans, heavy hydrocarbons) and capable of resolving such issues within a single process vessel.

The plant potential capacity is determined by the task set and the specific process parameters (primarily the pressure). With the average treatment pressure about 4.0 MPa, the capacity of a single unit may reach some 500–800 m cu. m/year in terms of the treated gas output.

The commercialization and a yearly successful operation of the GRASYS membrane APG treatment plant with the stable characteristics proves that the membrane technology is obviously one of the most promising and unique innovative methods of APG treatment and disposal.