THE 3 rd INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC CONFERENCES OF STUDENTS AND YOUNG RESEARCHERS dedicated to the 99
th
anniversary of the National Leader of Azerbaijan Heydar Aliyev
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IDENTIFICATION OF SAFE PROCESS CONDITIONS TO AVOID CAVITATION AND FLASHING IN PRESSURE CONTROL LOOP AT BHOS EMERSON TEST RIG Laman Hasanli Baku Higher Oil School Baku, Azerbaijan laman.hasanli.std@bhos.edu.az Supervisor: Ph.D, Associate Professor Erkin Ibragimov Keywords: Cavitation, Flashing, Pressure measurement, Vapor pressure, Vena contracta
In the modern world, the oil and gas industry has a crucial role in the
energy sector, so in worldwide trade. Control valves are widely used in
pressure, level, flow measurements in the different parts of the oil and natural
gas sector, such as upstream, midstream, and downstream. One of the most
crucial objectives in this industry is to minimize personnel injury, exposure
and any threat to equipment life.
Cavitation and flashing inside valves can cause significant destruction in
any valve itself, the downstream parts connected, and related equipment given
enough time. Performance deterioration, mechanical damage, especially on
plug and cage of valve, noise, and vibration are caused by cavitation. This
damage looks like dull, dark and grainy. Flashing can also cause severe
destruction on surfaces, mostly in the form of erosion of the valve plug,
appearing
shiny and scalloped [1]. Although
cavitation damage looks very
different compared to flashing, the result is the same: loss of throttling and shut-
off capability, ultimately lead to pump failure. Therefore, flashing and cavitation
should be handled during valve sizing procedure. Throughout this research
paper, safe process conditions have been investigated by reviewing cavitation
and flashing phenomenon, control valves, variable frequency drive [2].
It is important to know both the fluid properties (such as vapor pressure)
and the system properties (such as process pressure and temperature) to
understand whether there is a potential condition for cavitation or flashing,
which can cause significant valve damage, even with clean fluids that do not
contain any solids. In order to predict and establish safe conditions to safely
operate the control valve without cavitation and flashing effects, some
calculations were made [3].
Proper technologies have been identified for further investigation. The
simulation has been performed on changing of the process parameters for
Fisher EZ control valve. Various parameters to determine the safe conditions
were examined by means of Fisher software. Based on the principle of
differential pressure measurement, it has been likely to achieve desired safe
process circumstances to avoid cavitation and flashing in pressure control loop.