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Natural Gas and hydrogen blending: a perspective on numerical modeling and CFD analysis for transient and steady-state scenarios

  • Sukriti Sharma and Asad H. Sahir ORCID logo EMAIL logo
Published/Copyright: February 26, 2025
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Chemical Product and Process Modeling
From the journal Chemical Product and Process Modeling Volume 20 Issue 1

Abstract

The integration of hydrogen as an energy carrier into an existing natural gas pipeline infrastructure presents a promising option for the decarbonization of the energy sector. However, using hydrogen in natural gas pipelines requires overcoming engineering challenges attributed to physical property and design considerations for both natural gas and hydrogen which may result in pipeline failures. To this end, this study employs a multi-software engineering approach to model both steady-state and transient behaviors of natural gas pipelines blended with hydrogen under cyclic variations. For transient state modeling, the Crank-Nicolson implicit scheme is applied to a 100 km pipeline with 200 nodes, using a time interval of 20 s in MATLAB. The one dimensional flow modeling aspects are analyzed in more detail with the finite element method in COMSOL. The study also highlights the importance of pipeline inventory analysis, focusing on the trade-off between gas transport capacity and flexibility; particularly with respect to packing and drafting operations. The intrinsic properties of hydrogen blends (0–20 %) are analyzed using the GERG Equation of State (EoS) in ASPEN. Results indicate that the COMSOL model shows less stability than the Crank-Nicolson method for abrupt demand changes, with a percentage error of ±11 % compared to the benchmark study. Additionally, inventory analysis suggests that to prevent pipeline failure, the pipeline can only be drafted for 3.6 h. Steady-state analysis reveals that blending hydrogen into natural gas significantly impacts pipeline design, with changes in specific gravity, compressibility factor, and speed of sound. The study also finds that higher hydrogen blending reduces the pressure drop under isothermal conditions, resulting in lower compressor power requirements. This modeling approach provides a foundation for strategies aimed at adapting natural gas infrastructure for hydrogen use.

Keywords: Natural gas; hydrogen; numerical methods; pipelines; process engineering
Corresponding author: Asad H. Sahir, Department of Chemical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Ropar, Rupnagar, 140001, India, E-mail:

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Indian Science Technology and Engineering Facilities Map (I-STEM), the Program supported by the Office of the Principal Scientific Adviser to the Govt. of India, for enabling access to the COMSOL Multiphysics 7.0 software suite used to carry out this work. The authors also are grateful to the Ministry of Education, Government of India for supporting their research. The support provided by Mr. Nikhil Singh Jadon is gratefully acknowledged.

  1. Research ethics: Not applicable.

  2. Informed consent: Not applicable.

  3. Author contributions: SS: Modeling and analysis, Data curation, Methodology, Visualization, Literature Review, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing. AHS: Conceptualization, Literature Review, Writing – review & editing, supervision of manuscript development, resources.

  4. Use of Large Language Models, AI and Machine Learning Tools: None to declare, as the authors have not employed Large Language Models, AI and Machine Learning Tools in the preparation of manuscript.

  5. Conflict of interest: The authors state no conflict of interest.

  6. Research funding: None declared

  7. Data availability: The raw data can be obtained on request from the corresponding author.

Nomenclature

A

Cross-sectional area of the pipe (m2)

D

Diameter of the pipe (m)

H

Helmholtz free energy (J)

H o

Helmholtz free energy at ideal gas mixture property (J)

H r

Helmholtz free energy at residual mixture behavior (J)

I

No. of spatial grid points

K e

Effective roughness (micro-inches)

L

Length of pipeline (m)

P b

Base pressure (different units Eqs. (13)–(15))

P 1

Inlet pressure in kPa

P 2

Outlet pressure in kPa

Q

Volumetric flow rate (m3/s)

Q N

Normal volumetric flow rate (m3/s)

R

Gas constant (J kg−1 K−1)

T

Temperature of the gas (K)

T b

Base Temperature (different units Eqs. (13), (14) & (15))

c

Speed of sound (m/s)

f

Fanning friction factor

g

Acceleration due to gravity (m2/s)

p

Gas pressure (MPa)

p 0

Inlet gas pressure (MPa)

p i

Outlet gas pressure (MPa)

p *

Dimensionless gas pressure

q

Mass flow rate (kg/s)

s

Specific gravity of the gas

t

Time (s)

t *

Dimensionless time

v

Velocity (m/s)

x

Spatial coordinate

z

Compressibility factor of the gas

ρ

Gas density (kg/m3)

ρ N

Normal gas density (kg/m3)

τ

Tangential stress (Pa)

θ

Angle of inclination (0)

Δx

Spatial discretization (m)

x ¯

Molar composition vector

Δt

Time discretization (s)

Subscripts

N

property under normal conditions

n

temporal variation

i

spatial variation

Abbreviations

AGA

American Gas Association

COP

Conference of Parties

CFD

Computational Fluid Dynamics

CGD

Compressed Natural Gas

EoS

Equation of State

FEM

Finite Element Method

GERG

Groupe Européen de Recherches Gazières

PDE

Partial Differential Equation

PNG

Piped Natural Gas

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Supplementary Material

This article contains supplementary material (https://doi.org/10.1515/cppm-2024-0066).

Received: 2024-07-18
Accepted: 2025-01-23
Published Online: 2025-02-26

© 2025 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

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https://doi.org/10.1515/cppm-2024-0066
Keywords for this article
Natural gas; hydrogen; numerical methods; pipelines; process engineering

Articles in the same Issue

  1. Frontmatter
  2. Research Articles
  3. Cogeneration system’s energy performance improvement by using P-graph and advanced process control
  4. Numerical simulation of R134a evaporation in a cold water production system
  5. Implementing a radial basis function model to anticipate the outcomes of the gasification
  6. Sensitivity analysis and optimization of the whole process of continuous catalytic reforming for Persian gulf star oil company using an optimized data-driven model with tuned parameters
  7. Evaluating the therapeutic potential of 4-hydroxyflavanes diastereomers derivatives against (MetAP2) for anti-cancer therapy: a molecular docking study
  8. Enhanced cryogenic distillation column identification for methane separation: a hybrid artificial neural network approach
  9. Natural Gas and hydrogen blending: a perspective on numerical modeling and CFD analysis for transient and steady-state scenarios
  10. Simulation and optimization of Venturi type bubble generator to improve cavitation
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