Modeling and Simulation of Steady State Model Approach for

Horizontal Three Phase Separator (HTPS)

Bayu Triwibowo1,*, Haniif Prasetiawan1, Anwaruddin Hisyam2, Mohammad Fariz Fauzan1 and
Muhammad Habib Fahd Rizky1

1
Chemical Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering, Universitas Negeri Semarang, Sekaran, Gunungpati,
50299, Semarang, Indonesia
2
Faculty of Chemical and Natural Resources Engineering, Universiti Malaysia Pahang, Lebuhraya Tun Razak,
26300, Kuantan, Pahang Darul Makmur, Malaysia

*Corresponding author: bayu.triwibowo@mail.unnes.ac.id

Abstract. Main function of oil production facility is to separate oil well stream into three phases i.e. oil, gas and water.
Vessel called three phase separator is used for this purpose, commonly in horizontal arrangement. In order to optimize
the process, accurate model for horizontal three phase separator is needed. Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) is a
mathematical tool capable of simulating a wide range of fluid flows. HTPS dimensions used in this simulation were taken
from one of oil and gas company in Indonesia. The CFD simulation used in this study is based on volume of fluid and k-ε
turbulence models. Gas outlet was assumed using porous media zone model with fluid porosity 0.99. Simulation result
displayed concentration and velocity distribution for each component inside HTPS. The result of concentration
distribution shows that the region of fluid divided into upper region and lower region. The lower region major component
were water and upper region mainly consist of gas and oil. The contour of concentration distribution indicated good
separation process with distribution of water flow rate at outlet water, outlet oil, and outlet gas (lb/min) respectively are
405,67; 115,65 ; and 172.01.

INTRODUCTION
The main function of an oil production facility is to separate the oil well stream into three phases (oil, gas, and
water) and process these phases into some marketable products such as gasoline, jet fuel, diesel fuel LPG and many
other products1. Oil, gas and water separation process is based on differences in density and most separators are
gravity separators2. Gravity-based separators include horizontal three-phase separators (HTPS) consisting of large
cylindrical vessels designed to provide a sufficient residence time for gravity-based separation of liquid
droplets3.Commonly, HTPS design faces some problems mainly poor universal, too large equipment size and low
separation efficiency4. In order to obtain optimum separation process, preliminary study on HTPS design is required.
Computational Fluid Dynamic (CFD) represents an alternative tool used by academician and industrial
community to study fluid dynamic in a certain process. This method is preferable since it is more universal than
semi-empirical model and more flexible than the experimental techniques 3. CFD also provides fluid flows
visualizations within a separator as well as an ability to track the gas/liquid and liquid/liquid interfacesmovement 5.
Previous studies used CFD for single phase separator simulation 6. Generally HTPS inlet is place on vessel head,
inlet mixtures will flows directly inside HTPS and might disturb and decrease separation process efficiency. Yu et
al.4 studied fluid flow distribution inside HTPS by varying entrance component type. This entrance component was
efficient to avoid vortex formation during water/oil separation process. There is an alternative to replace the entrance
component in HTPS by placing inlet pipe on the shell side, and face the outlet to the HTPS head. This HTPS
arrangement might be able to reduce the inlet stream momentum and reduce disturbance possibility during
separation process.
 In this study, oil/water/gas separation in HTPS was conducted using CFD with inlet arrangement in shell side,
supplementary data for HTPS simulation was obtained from one of oil and gas company in Indonesia. Oil/water/gas
velocity profile and composition distribution have been studied in steady state condition.

METHODS
Horizontal Three Phase Separator (HTPS) for this simulation was used to separate crude oil that consists of
vapor, oil, and water component. The properties of components that flow through inlet separator are shown in table
1.
Table 1. Properties of component that flow through inlet.
Component Flow rate (lb/hr) Density (lb/ft3)
Water 267630 62.06
Oil 50392 52.96
Vapor 33662.40 0.55

The geometry for this simulation is HTPS with 120 inches of diameter and 30 feet of length. The geometry is
divided by 222537 elements of finite volume with full tetrahedral mesh. The mesh for this geometry has 0.23
skewness average (< 0.25) that shows excellent quality mesh.

(a) (b)

Figure 1. Geometry of HTPS that consist of boundary condition division (a) and grid generation (b)

The governing equation for the steady state model approach simulation was used to reduce the time consumed by
simulation process so it will be able to obtain fast and accurate simulation results. The turbulence model is
calculated using k-ε model since the flow rate is high with relatively continued fast pace inlet. The components (oil,
vapor, and water) used species transport interaction without chemical reaction. The outlet of vapor is a separated
fluid body which modeled as porous media with 0.99 fluid porosity and one dimensional mass transfer assumption.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Study of Vector Velocity Profile

Vector velocity profile of horizontal three phase separator is shown in Figure 2. The separator is equipped with
half pipe distributor at inlet but it can be seen that reversed flow is still happened (shown in red circle). Reversed
flow is the inverse of fully developed flow which will lead stagnant flow in certain fluid zone. Stagnant and reversed
flow indicates the presence of gas trapped in liquid phase which is hard to be released and vice versa. This condition
will cause decreased separation efficiency.
Inlet feed located in shell separator was equipped with half pipe distributor to direct the feed flow towards left
side of separator relative to the geometry (shown as curved blue arrow). This arrangement gave longer residence
time for fluid inside the separator.
Dashed line on the middle of separator shown the tendency of reversed flow. In steady state condition, lower part
of separator (under dashed line) dominantly will be filled with water. In the other hand, the lighter components with
lower density such as air and oil will be separated at the upper part of separator.
 Figure 2. Vector velocity (m/s) of HTPS

Study of Concentration Distribution

Figure 3 shows the contour of volume fraction distribution of water, oil and vapor in the horizontal three phase
separator. It can be seen that volume fraction inside HTPS was separated into two parts that is the upper layer (oil
and vapor) and the lower layer (water). This profile was consistent in which the existence of water in the lower layer
caused a driving force that created reversed flow. So, the oil and vapor phase were directly going up to the upper
layer of horizontal three phase separator.

(a)

(b)

(c)

Figure 3. Volume Fraction Contour Distribution of: (a) phase 1 (water) (b) phase 2 (oil) and (c) phase 3 (vapor)
 Figure 3(a) shows that the lower of the separator level, it has higher water phase volume fraction. This is in line
with the water property which has higher density rather than oil and vapor phase. It also can be seen small amount of
water in the upper layer, this is due to the effect of reversed flow and also water was vaporized at its bubble point.
Figure 3(b) and (c) oil and vapor volume fraction distribution were reversely similar with water volume fraction
distribution. The higher separator level has higher oil and vapor volume fraction. Vapor phase has highest volume
fraction in the upper layer, it is due to gas density is the lowest compared to water and oil density.
Reversed flow phenomenon also presents in Figure 3. This phenomenon was happened during the separation
process of water oil and gas. Once two layer were formed which are bottom layer (water) and upper layer, vapor
phase naturally will go through the bottom layer which is mostly water. Reversed flow in this process seems not
sufficiently accelerate vapor to go through water phase. Meanwhile, droplet of oil will be separated from water
phase due to the difference of density and immiscibility of both components.
Outlet result of horizontal three phase separator model is presented in Table 2. Component density and geometry
was important thing in three phase separator model. Another key point in this separation is mesh at the vapor outlet
which might gave better separation due to its geometric factor and the existence of absorbent which might promote
chemical reaction and increase separation efficiency.

Table 2. Horizontal Three Phase Separator Outlet Flow Rate

Surface Water (lb/min) Oil (lb/min) Vapor (lb/min)
Outlet water 405.67 3.94 119.63
Outlet oil 115.65 4.99 90.97
Outlet vapor 172.01 2.11 260.64

CONCLUSION
Steady state model approach has been done for the simulation of horizontal three phase separator. Small number
of oil and vapor was trapped in the water phase due to reversed flow phenomena. At the vapor outlet stream, it can
be found the presence of water. It is due to demister model used in this simulation. This might be avoided by refined
the demister model into droplet size distribution and different mechanism need to be applied to model water
absorbance. Oil – vapor separation is still not modeled perfectly shown by the huge number of oil found in the vapor
outlet stream. Improvement of this model is needed such as modeling the droplet size distribution. Oil in this
simulation need to modeled using droplet model and set the demister size smaller that oil droplet size, so that the
demister able to screen the oil droplet.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This work was supported by DIPA FT UNNES 2016.

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