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Relief and Blowdown System Flaring

Avocado Engineering models operational scenarios of venting and relief systems to minimize risks and optimize equipment sizing. They simulate relief systems and flaring under various operational conditions before construction to ensure safe design. Avocado Engineering works with engineering teams to support their design using software like FLARENET and HYSYS to optimize sizing. They provide consultation, advice and simulation for any process requiring relief and flare analysis.

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Ricardo Napitupulu
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371 views

Relief and Blowdown System Flaring

Avocado Engineering models operational scenarios of venting and relief systems to minimize risks and optimize equipment sizing. They simulate relief systems and flaring under various operational conditions before construction to ensure safe design. Avocado Engineering works with engineering teams to support their design using software like FLARENET and HYSYS to optimize sizing. They provide consultation, advice and simulation for any process requiring relief and flare analysis.

Uploaded by

Ricardo Napitupulu
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Relief, Blowdown and Flare Modeling

At Avocado Engineering, our professional team of engineers model various operational


scenarios of venting and relief of the hydrocarbon fluids via the flare network to
minimize the risks of over-pressurizing of the process piping and equipment or to limit
the pressure to a safe operational region.

Before the construction of any process that requires relief system and flaring, such as
offshore/onshore oil/gas facilities, gas collection and separation areas, biodigestion
processing and biomass/biogas operations in the food or waste processing facilities, it is
recommended to simulate and model the operation of relief system and flaring under
various operational scenarios such as in the emergency modes of operation, start-ups
and shut-downs, and during other possible relief conditions at normal operation modes,
to ensure that the system is designed at the optimum design conditions and to minimize
the associated risks of failure of relief systems in cases of emergency.

We are pleased to work with your engineering teams to synergize the design and to
support your design and optimize your equipment sizing under various modeling
conditions using specialized softwares and packages such as FLARENET, FLARESIM
HYSYS dynamic simulator, PRO/II steady-state process simulator and PHAST.

Avocado Engineering is pleased to provide advice, consultation and simulation in


conjunction with your designs done by your process design engineers. Below are some
brief explanations on the scopes of our works and services in this range.

Flare Network Design

The relief and blowdown systems are designed to reduce or limit the pressure of the
processing facilities safely during an emergency situation or under manual initiation, and
thereby prevent equipment rupture due to the overpressurizing. Released hydrocarbon
fluids are collected from atmospheric or pressurized equipment and are disposed of via
the HP or LP flare system at a safe location.

The relief and blowdown system is part of the overall safety system providing the
ultimate protection. All design documentations, including calculations, for the relief and
blowdown sizing are required as the input for the flare system design. The flare, relief
and blowdown systems start at the equipment being protected and finish at the flare

Avocado Engineering Pty. Ltd.


Address: 24/17-23 Green Street Kogarah NSW AUSTRALIA 2217 M: +61 4 22088578 Page 1
 ABN: 17 155 713 885 E: [email protected]  W: www.avocadoengineering.com
tip/vent tips. As part of the flare and relief systems, knockout drums (also called relief
drums) are also required to be considered. Knockout drums separate any liquid droplets
that are carried over with the gas before the gas is sent to the flare stack for ignition.

Figure 1. An example of the flare network simulation.

A calculation record is prepared for each relief valve within each sectionalized area. The
data can then be used as the input for the flare network system design. This includes
the Relief Device Summary Tables. Our flare system design engineers incorporate the
information into a Flare Load Summary Table, which is the basis of the flare design. The
flare design will be based on an assessment of the coincident cases considering all the
required overpressure relief and blowdown situations.

All possible causes of overpressure are considered in the sizing of the relief and
blowdown valves. Various different emergency cases and operational flaring loads will
be reviewed in the flare system design. The data from each sectionalized area will be
compiled into a Flare Load Summary table to give the total flare loads possible for each
scenario considered.

Avocado Engineering Pty. Ltd.


Address: 24/17-23 Green Street Kogarah NSW AUSTRALIA 2217 M: +61 4 22088578 Page 2
 ABN: 17 155 713 885 E: [email protected]  W: www.avocadoengineering.com
The flare scenarios to be
considered will include blowdown
loads, vent valve loads and
simultaneous fire relief from all of
the equipment within each fire
area.

FLARENET is used for sizing of


flare network piping. FLARENET
enables our engineers to perform
steady-state design, rating or
debottlenecking of single or
multiple flare and vent systems.

The simulator can calculate minimum sizes for new flare systems or evaluate
alternatives to remove bottlenecks in existing relief networks. FLARENET can also be
used to identify potentially dangerous relief scenarios during the design phase or
current operational scenarios. The program can be used to demonstrate regulatory
compliance of the flare and vent systems in relation to over pressure and noise
regulations.

Depressurizing and Low Temperature Studies

Low temperature studies during flow assurance analysis are performed to determine if
the methodology specified for a facility is appropriate for the likelihood of the low
temperature excursions that may occur. This can be applied to both the new and
existing equipment. The study is intended to cover all systems on a facility that might be
subjected to low temperatures during any or
all of the following scenarios:

 Start-up and repressurization/shutdown


 Normal operation
 Process upsets
 Process control fluctuations
 Draining
 Depressurizing (either in emergency or
during maintenance modes)

Avocado Engineering Pty. Ltd.


Address: 24/17-23 Green Street Kogarah NSW AUSTRALIA 2217 M: +61 4 22088578 Page 3
 ABN: 17 155 713 885 E: [email protected]  W: www.avocadoengineering.com
Any change in the operation that has occurred after the equipment was originally placed
into service, which may cause a lower Critical Exposure Temperature (CET) than it was
originally designed for, is of special concern.

Blowdown and depressurization of equipment can be modeled using a variety of


different simulation methods such as:

 HYSYS Dynamic Model (note that this does not require HYSYS dynamics to run)
 PRO/II Steady State simulator

The choice of depressurizing model is dependent on the system to be depressurized.


The HYSYS dynamic depressurizing model allows full specification of the system to be
depressurized, including isentropic efficiency, vessel volume and mass, vessel specific
heat, initial liquid volume and the heat transfer area (either the total vessel surface area
or the wetted area whichever is appropriate), mass of the system in contact with the
vapor and liquid, heat transfer model to be used, and so on.

Pressure-Relief Device Sizing

A pressure-relief device protects


process equipment from the hazards of
high (or low) pressure in a process. It
operates by opening at a designated
pressure and ejecting mass from the
process. The ejected mass contains
energy and the removal of the energy
reduces the process pressure.

The API Standard 520, Part 1 and API


Standard 521 are the most widely used
standards for sizing relief devices and
relief load calculation in the chemical
process industries.

The objective of the relief sizing calculation is to determine the required relief area for
the relief device. Almost every relief device installation has its own unique design issues
and special considerations that will impact the relief sizing calculations.

Avocado Engineering Pty. Ltd.


Address: 24/17-23 Green Street Kogarah NSW AUSTRALIA 2217 M: +61 4 22088578 Page 4
 ABN: 17 155 713 885 E: [email protected]  W: www.avocadoengineering.com
Flare Location Study

The scope of this study is to assess the radiation, dispersion and noise impact of
hydrocarbon and toxic gas releases arising from the flare and to establish a distance
required between the plant and flare based on the specified criteria.

Radiation and noise calculations are performed by


FLARESIM. FLARESIM, developed by Softbits is a
sophisticated flare simulation/design software. It models
thermal radiation and noise footprints generated by flare
systems for offshore platforms, gas plants, refineries and
chemical plants, and predicts the temperature of the
exposed surfaces within range. Flaresim can provide a full
3D flame-shape analysis with flexibility in the location and
orientation of multiple stacks, and rapid evaluation of flare
systems under different wind speeds and directions.
Flaresim can also size stack or boom length to meet
specific radiation, noise or surface temperature limits at
the defined receptor points.

PHAST (Process Hazard Analysis Software Tool) is used


to model the flash fire, dispersion of SO2 as a toxic
product of combustion and in addition, the dispersion of
H2S for the case of unignited releases. PHAST has the
ability to simulate the progress of a potential incident from
the initial release to far-field dispersion including modeling
of pool spreading and evaporation, and flammable and
toxic effects including explosions and fires.

In summary, Avocado Engineering is pleased to provide advice, consultation and


simulation packages for any process design that requires the relief and flare analysis
and simulations.

We look forward to hearing from you.

Yours sincerely,

Dr. Amir Moezzi.

Chief Adviser (Process Technologies, Chemicals and Procurement)

Avocado Engineering Pty. Ltd.


Address: 24/17-23 Green Street Kogarah NSW AUSTRALIA 2217 M: +61 4 22088578 Page 5
 ABN: 17 155 713 885 E: [email protected]  W: www.avocadoengineering.com

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