June 2022
Over the years, we have delivered many decompression plants that have had the purpose of continuously feeding, for example, an industrial furnace with climate-friendly fossil-free biogas to replace, for example, oil as an energy source. What happens then is that the customer receives full biogas cylinders with pressures of 200-250 bar that need to be regulated down to the desired pressure, often only a few bars.
When compressing gas, the distance between the gas molecules decreases and the increased kinetic energy causes the gas to become hot and therefore the gas needs to be cooled between each compression step. In the case of depressurization, the opposite is true and we need to heat the gas between each depressurization regulator. This is what we solve with our decompression plants, where the gas is depressurized in a controlled manner and reheated between each stage. Of course, this task is made easier by the fact that a relatively even and continuous flow is usually desired.
When we commissioned our new decompression plant for Gasum in Nynäshamn before the summer, the conditions were completely different; instead of a continuous supply, the biogas would now serve as a back-up operation in the event of a power outage and reduce the risk of expensive restarts. We therefore had to design the plant to deliver gas at 37 bar pressure and a flow rate of 4000 kg/h within a few seconds. The flow itself is huge as it corresponds to two mobile gas cylinders per hour and the challenge of being able to start immediately all year round, posed great challenges for both our automation technicians and the gas boiler that is responsible for the controlled heating of the gas after each pressure reduction step.
Thanks to good planning and cooperation with the customer, we finished on time and now our "Usain Bolt" is standing in the starting blocks, waiting for the starting shot that may come tomorrow, maybe in a year. And all the time without getting cold or cramping. Want to know more about our decompression facilities? Get in touch and we'll be happy to help!