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Abstract
Liqueed natural gas (LNG) is being developed as a transportation fuel for heavy vehicles such as trucks and transit buses, to
lessen the dependency on oil and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The LNG stations are properly designed to prevent the venting
of natural gas (NG) from LNG tanks, which can cause evaporative greenhouse gas emissions and result in uctuations of fuel ow
and changes of fuel composition. Boil-o is caused by the heat added into the LNG fuel during the storage and fueling. Heat can
leak into the LNG fuel through the shell of tank during the storage and through hoses and dispensers during the fueling. Gas from
tanks onboard vehicles, when returned to LNG tanks, can add additional heat into the LNG fuel. A thermodynamic and heat
transfer model has been developed to analyze dierent mechanisms of heat leak into the LNG fuel. The evolving of properties and
compositions of LNG fuel inside LNG tanks is simulated. The eect of a number of buses fueled each day on the possible total fuel
loss rate has been analyzed. It is found that by increasing the number of buses, fueled each day, the total fuel loss rate can be reduced
signicantly. It is proposed that an electric generator be used to consume the boil-o gas or a liqueer be used to re-liquefy the boil-
o gas to reduce the tank pressure and eliminate fuel losses. These approaches can prevent boil-o of natural gas emissions, and
reduce the costs of LNG as transportation fuel.
2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Liqueed natural gas; Transportation fuel; Cryogenics; Thermodynamics; Heat transfer
Nomenclature
vehicle tanks are returned to the bulk storage tank, this This nearly six orders of magnitude dierence in thermal
additional heat must be taken into account. The fol- conductivity necessitates a low value of the ratio of the
lowing are several mechanisms, which add heat into the support junction area to the total area of nearly ve
LNG fuel and may cause boil-o. orders of magnitude.
The boil-o rate of LNG due to heat leak through the
2.1. Heat leak through shell of LNG storage tank shell of LNG storage tank is estimated as
m1 q=hg hl ; 4
The thermal resistance of the shell of tank can be
estimated as [8] where hg and hl are the enthalpies of methane in gaseous
R 1=1=Rm 1=Rs ; 1 and liquid states, respectively. From the above equation,
the boil-o rate of LNG can be estimated as
where resistance of the multilayer superinsulation,
Rm Dh=km S [9], parasitic heat resistance of the sup- r m1 =V q DT km ks ab=qDhhg hl ; 5
port connecting the inner and outer shells of tank
where q is theR density of LNG. Enthalpy of liquid
Rs Dh=ks Ss [9], S is the area of inner shell of tank, Ss T
methane, hl 0 cp dT . Correlation for heat capacity of
is the area of support junction, Dh is the thickness of
liquid methane is based on a series expansion in tem-
multilayer superinsulation, km is the average thermal
perature, cp A BT CT 2 DT 3 , where A 5149,
conductivity of superinsulation, and ks is the conduc-
B 43:249, C 0:301449, and D 4:49243
104
tivity of stainless steel. The heat ow rate across the shell
[11]. The enthalpy of gaseous methane can be obtained
of LNG tank is estimated as
as hg hl DH where the heat of vaporization is based
T n
km S ks S s on the Watson correlation [11], DH DH1 TTccT , and
q DT =R DT 1
Dh Dh the heat of vaporization of methane DH1 0:5095
106
J/kg at T1 111:65 K, Tc 190:55 K, and n 0:38 for
DT km S ks aS=Dh DT km ks abV =Dh; 2
90:55 K < T < 190:55 K.
where the ratio of the support junction area and total Fig. 2(a) shows the boil-o rate as a function of
area a Ss =S, the area density of tank b S=V , and V insulation thickness for b 2 and T 162 C. The
is the capacity of LNG tank. The temperature dierence boil-o rate here means what percentage of fuel to be
between the ambient and the LNG is DT T1 T , boiled o to keep the same temperature when heat is
where T1 is the ambient temperature. For a plain tube added into the fuel. The boil-o rate strongly depends
the area density is b 4=D, where D is the diameter of on the area of the cross-section of the support strut,
the tube. From Eq. (2) the heat conductance of the tank which links the outer and inner shells of the tank. For
shell is junction area ration a 0:005%, the boil-o rate for
insulation of 1.5-in. thickness is 0.83% per day. With a
C km ks abV =Dh: 3
reduction in the area of strut cross-section, e.g.,
The thermal conductivity of superinsulation km is a 0:002%, the boil-o rate is reduced to 0.34% per day
generally estimated as 5 105 W/m K [10], and con- for the insulation of the same thickness. From Eqs. (4)
ductivity of 1% chrome steel at 0 C, ks as 43 W/m K. and (5), boil-o rate r 0:83% for 13,000 gal (49.2 m3 )
2 5
Boil-off rate (kg/kg% per day)
4
1.5 0.01%
0.01% 3
1 0.005%
0.005% 2
0.002%
0.5 0.002%
1
=0.001%
=0.001%
0 0
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3
(a) thickness of superinsulation (inch) (b) thickness of superinsulation (inch)
Fig. 2. (a) Boil-o rate and (b) thermal conductance as a function of thickness of multilayer superinsulation for a tank with an area density of b 2,
which is lled with LNG at )162 C.
704 Q.-S. Chen et al. / Cryogenics 44 (2004) 701709
Table 1
Methane pressure and density at liquid [13] and gaseous states [Eq. (6)]
Pressure (psi) Temperature (C) Liquid density (kg/m3 ) Gas density (kg/m3 )
0 )162.2 ()260 F) 424.2 (3.54 lb/gal) 0
50 )140.0 ()220 F) 390.6 (3.26 lb/gal) 5.43
100 )128.8 ()200 F) 370.3 (3.09 lb/gal) 10.60
150 )120.5 ()185 F) 357.1 (2.98 lb/gal) 15.77
Q.-S. Chen et al. / Cryogenics 44 (2004) 701709 705
2.5. Heat release by boil-o 3. Dynamic process during LNG storage and fueling
When heat is added into the LNG, the vapor pressure To get a picture of how the properties and composi-
inside the tank will increase. Venting of natural gas can tion of LNG in an LNG tank change we need to use a
be used to reduce the vapor pressure and thus the LNG dynamic model to simulate the storage and fueling
temperature. We assume that the vapor is in the satu- process. A heat transfer model can be used to describe
rated state, so that the relationship between the vapor the thermal history while a thermodynamic model can
pressure and temperature of LNG is known. If the ini- be used to obtain the properties and composition of
tial mass of LNG is ml , and temperature is reduced by LNG. During storage and fueling, the properties of
DT after venting a certain amount of LNG, m; the fol- LNG, such as enthalpy, mass, vapor pressure, temper-
lowing equation is valid for small DT ature and density, also change with time. The changes in
hg T hl T m hl T hl T DT enthalpy, H , and mass, M, of cryogenic LNG can be
described using the following equations
m1 m 13 dH
V_fill ql0 hl T0 CT1 T nVbus ql cpl T
From the above equation, the boil-o rate is then dt
n hfueling m_ over cpl T m_ vent cpg T ; 15
r m=m1
hl T hl T DT =hg T hl T DT : 14 dM
V_fill ql0 m_ over m_ vent nVbus ql ; 16
dt
The percentage of LNG to be boiled o in order to where T0 is the temperature of LNG to be lled into the
reduce vapor pressure is shown in Fig. 4. For example, storage vessel, T1 is the ambient temperature, C is the
to reduce the saturated vapor pressure from 150 psi to 0, thermal conductance of the shell of cryogenic tank, V_fill
28.9% LNG is to be boiled. Similarly, to reduce the is the rate of lling the storage tank, m_ over is the overow
saturated vapor pressure from 150 to 100 psi, 7.7% LNG rate when the volume of LNG is larger than the capacity
has to be boiled o, and from 100 to 50 psi, 9.2% LNG of tank, m_ vent is the venting rate, Vbus is onboard tank
has to be boiled o. Evidently, the venting of boiled o capacity, and hfueling is the enthalpy added to the LNG
gas can result in the loss of a large amount of LNG. fuel when fueling a bus. By knowing the total enthalpy
Certainly, venting is not an ecient way to reduce the and mass, temperature of the cryogenic natural gas can
vapor pressure and has to be avoided. Options to reduce be obtained by solving the following equations
the vapor pressure include arranging LNG delivery
schedule, e.g., to ll the station storage tank when the H Ml hl T Mg hg T ; 17
vapor pressure is high, or to use vapor in the station M Ml Mg ; 18
storage tank to power an electric generator or a lique-
er. V Ml =ql Mg =qg : 19
706 Q.-S. Chen et al. / Cryogenics 44 (2004) 701709
then updated as T T 0 H Ml hl T 0 Mg hg T 0 =
140
Table 3
Predicted changes of vapor pressure for a cryogenic tank of 15,000 gal, which has a thermal conductance of 1 W/K
Day p (psi) T (K) V (gal) H (J) Vent (kg) Overow (kg) Liquid (kg) Gas (kg)
0 140.20 150.87 2571.00 0.246E+10 0.0 0.0 3500.6 695.5
1 143.33 151.39 2565.67 0.247E+10 0.0 0.0 3485.3 710.8
2 146.46 151.91 2560.33 0.248E+10 0.0 0.0 3470.0 726.0
3 148.98 152.33 2556.07 0.250E+10 0.0 0.0 3457.8 738.2
4 152.12 152.85 2550.74 0.251E+10 0.0 0.0 3442.6 753.5
5 155.27 153.38 2545.41 0.252E+10 0.0 0.0 3427.4 768.7
Q.-S. Chen et al. / Cryogenics 44 (2004) 701709 707
Table 4
Pressure build-up in a 13,000 gal cryogenic tank with 10,000 gal initial ll at 50 psi and C 1 W/K
Day p (psi) T (K) V (gal) H (J) Vent (kg) Overow (kg) Liquid (kg) Gas (kg)
0 50.00 133.00 10000.00 0.675E+10 0.0 0.0 14785.8 61.7
1 50.96 133.21 10009.29 0.677E+10 0.0 0.0 14784.9 62.6
2 51.89 133.42 10018.41 0.678E+10 0.0 0.0 14783.9 63.6
3 53.30 133.74 10032.14 0.680E+10 0.0 0.0 14782.5 65.0
4 54.23 133.95 10041.30 0.681E+10 0.0 0.0 14781.6 65.9
5 55.63 134.26 10055.06 0.682E+10 0.0 0.0 14780.3 67.2
6 56.56 134.47 10064.23 0.684E+10 0.0 0.0 14779.4 68.1
7 57.49 134.68 10073.42 0.685E+10 0.0 0.0 14778.5 69.0
8 58.88 134.99 10087.24 0.687E+10 0.0 0.0 14777.2 70.3
9 59.80 135.20 10096.46 0.688E+10 0.0 0.0 14776.3 71.2
10 61.19 135.51 10110.28 0.690E+10 0.0 0.0 14775.1 72.4
11 62.11 135.71 10119.52 0.691E+10 0.0 0.0 14774.2 73.3
12 63.03 135.92 10128.77 0.692E+10 0.0 0.0 14773.4 74.1
13 64.41 136.23 10142.66 0.694E+10 0.0 0.0 14772.2 75.3
14 65.32 136.43 10151.92 0.695E+10 0.0 0.0 14771.4 76.1
15 66.69 136.74 10165.84 0.697E+10 0.0 0.0 14770.2 77.3
20 100
18
16
Fuel lost (kg/kg%)
75
Fuel lost (kg/kg%)
14
12 C=5 W/K
10 50
C=5 W/K
8
6
C=2 W/K 25 C=2 W/K
4
C=1 W/K
2 C=
1 W/K
0 0
0 5 10 15 0 5 10 15
(a) Number of buses (b) Number of buses
Fig. 6. (a) Total fuel loss and (b) fuel loss per day with number of buses.
when fueling two buses everyday. The fuel loss is re- 4. Boil-o gas to power an electric generator or be re-
duced 0.4% when fueling four buses every day. The liqueed
vented gas as a function of number of buses is shown in
Fig. 6(b). For thermal conductance of 2 W/K, the The pressure of boil-o gas may build up inside the
average fuel loss rate is 19.5 kg each day when fueling LNG tank if few buses are fueled each day. When
two buses everyday. The fuel loss rate decreases to 3.4 venting is not favorable to reduce the storage tank
kg each day when fueling four buses every day. It is pressure, boil-o gas can be used to power an electric
evident that increasing number of buses fueled each day generator or be re-liqueed. Power to be supplied by
can reduce the fuel loss, as a percentage of total fuel using LNG is estimated as
delivered. The venting can be avoided when fueling
P mq=M DHc ew ; 20
more than ve buses each day using an LNG cryogenic
tank with C 2 W/K or fueling more than three buses where DHc is the heat of combustion of methane and ew
each day using a tank with C 1 W/K. It is important is the eciency to convert methane to electricity. For a
to reduce the thermal conductance of the shell of tank boil-o rate of 9.7 kg/day, heat of combustion
and the thermal conductance is related to the steel strut DHc 890 kJ/mol, and eciency ew 35% [2], the
support between shells of tank. supplied power is about P 188; 846 kJ/day or 2.9 hp.
708 Q.-S. Chen et al. / Cryogenics 44 (2004) 701709
The boil-o natural gas can be used to power an exceeds 150175 psi. In this model, a pressure-activated
electric generator or be re-liqueed using a 200-gpd valve is used to keep the tank pressure below 80 psi.
liqueer. Generally, two types of engines can be used for When the tank pressure exceeds the set-point, e.g., 80
the liqueer, naturally aspirated spark ignition natural psi, the three-way pressure-activated valve shown in Fig.
gas (SING) engine and port-injected dual-fuel or pilot 7 routes ullage vapor instead of liquid to the engine.
ignition natural gas (PING) engine. The SING engines This decreases the tank pressure the same way as vent-
with simple gas mixers, which are used in prior-gener- ing. When the fuel tank pressure is below a set-point
ation light-duty and medium LNG vehicles, requires (e.g., a pressure slightly higher than the engine fuel
fuel supply pressures of 20 psig or less [14]. For SING supply requirement), liquid is drawn from the tank to
engines that are turbocharged, the fuel supply pressure the engine.
requirement is typically in the 3040 psig range if a gas
mixer is used. However, current-generation heavy-duty
SING engines are turbocharged and use microproces- 5. Conclusions
sor-controlled fuel metering systems to optimize per-
formance and minimize emissions. Even though these We analyzed the mechanisms that may contribute to
engines inject the gas at intake manifold pressure, a the boil-o of LNG in LNG station storage tanks. Heat
signicant pressure dierential is required to ensure leak through the shell of storage tank is the main factor
accurate injection system operation. Fuel supply pres- for the boil-o of LNG. Special design of the strut can
sure requirements in the range of 60100 psig are typi- be used to reduce the heat leak rate of an LNG tank.
cally required for SING engines of this type. Another Thermal conductance can be used to characterize the
type of natural gas engine that is currently used in many potential heat leak of an LNG tank. Using dynamic
heavy-duty vehicles is the dual-fuel engine that meters analysis of heat transfer in the LNG system without
natural gas by port injection and initiates combustion by fueling buses, one can estimate the thermal conductance
direct injection of diesel fuel [11,15]. These turbocharged of an LNG tank. We calculated the pressure changes in
engines are variously referred to as port-injected dual- a 15,000 gal tank at an LNG station in Beijing, and the
fuel or pilot ignition natural gas (PING). The fuel predicted pressure changes compare well with the mea-
pressure requirements are in the range of 100130 sured pressure changes.
psig. Most of the current LNG-fueled heavy-duty We further considered an LNG station with a 13,000
eet vehicles use one of the two types of engines, SING gal tank. The number of bus fueled each day has a large
with microprocessor-controlled fuel metering, or port- eect on the total loss of fuel. By increasing number of
injected duel fuel. For other types of engines, refer to buses fueled each day in an LNG station the total fuel
[15]. loss can be greatly reduced. The total fuel loss for four
A typical storage LNG tank with electric generator or buses each fueled with 150 gal amounts to 0.4% kg/kg
liqueer module is shown in Fig. 7. The LNG tank when an LNG tank of C 2 W/K is used. The fuel loss
pressure should be below 175200 psi. LNG tank needs can be eliminated when more than ve buses are fueled
to be vented or vented gas be used when head pressure each day in a station with a tank of C 2 W/K thermal
Secondary PRV
LNG recirculation
Primary PRV
Vent
Refueling
LNG tank
Fuel from
Liquefier Gauge
conductance, or when more than three buses are fueled [2] Wegrzyn JE, Litzke W-L, Gurevich M. DOE/BNL Liquid Natural
each day in a station with a tank of C 1 W/K. Gas Heavy Vehicle Program, Future Transportation Technology
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SAE Technical Paper Series 981919.
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vapor in the LNG tank. Or a liqueer can be used to and buses, Government/Industry Meeting, Washington, DC,
liquefy the vapor and to prevent fuel loss in LNG sta- June 1921, 2000. SAE Technical paper Series 2000-01-
tions. These techniques can prevent the boil-o gas from 2210.
[4] Interim Report, Implementation of Advanced LCNG Fueling
venting and reduce fuel cost.
Infrastructure in Texas along the I-35/NAFTA Clean Corridor
However, in most cases, the minimum throughput Project, submitted to Department of Energy, Chicago Operation,
capacity of the liqueer is above the boil-o rate. Such by Blue Fuels Group L.P. formerly Lone Star Energy Company,
as for a 13,000-gal LNG tank, 3.9 gal LNG will be Contract # 9889, February, 2001.
boiled-o each day assuming boil-o rate of 0.03% per [5] Parker Hannin Corporation, 500 Glaspie Street, Oxford, MI
day [7]. The LPMRC liqueer size ranges from 200 to 48371.
[6] Carter JC, Argo-Tech Costa Mesa, 671 West 17th St., Cost Mesa,
8000 gpd according to [7]. The electricity generator may CA 92627.
be more feasible to consume the ullage gas when the [7] LPMRC Market Assessment & Plan, Prepared for the Gas
tank pressure is high, and to consume the fuel when the Research Institute by Zeus Development Corp., Contract No.
tank pressure is low. 8022 for consulting services, March 2000.
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1984.
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