Abu Dhabi Crude Oil Characterization and Evaluation for Gas Turbine Applications

Abstract

This study focused on the rheological and physiochemical characterization of three samples of light crude oil and a fuel oil obtained from oil-fields in the United Arab Emirates to determine the feasibility of using any of these liquid fuels from the Abu-dhabi Emirate as substitute or additive fuel for powering conventional gas turbines. Rheological and physicochemical properties such as n-heptane insoluble asphaltenes, apparent pH values, pour point, percentage moisture content, viscosity and density were measured according to the standard methods (American Society of Testing and Materials; ASTM). The dependence of density on temperature ranging from 20 oC to 200 oC was determined using Anton Paar DMA 5000 density meter at atmospheric pressure. Also, the impact of temperature on viscosity, shear stress τ, shear rate 𝛾̇, yield shear stress 𝜏𝑜 and thixotropic behavior was investigated and characterized by Haake RheoStress 6000. The exponential decrease of viscosity over temperature range was modeled using Arrhenius equation. Results showed that the activation energy for flow initiation for crude oil A, B, C and the fuel oil is 1246.1, 1201.3, 1309.5 and 4809.8 mPa.s.K, respectively. The shear stress–viscosity data revealed that crude oil A solely exhibited Newtonian behavior while crude oil B, C and fuel oil followed Herschel-Bulkley model over specific range of temperatures. This study also encapsulates the feasibility of powering a simple conventional gas turbine with liquid fuel using the modelling software IPSEproTM, this was done based on the variation of the elemental component of the sample. Variation of each component helped to determine its effect on power generation, quality and quantity of the exhaust of the turbine.

Date of Award	May 2015
Original language	American English
Supervisor	Mohammad Abu Zahra (Supervisor)