Gas Quality Can Only Be Determined by a Representative Sample

The Natural Gas Industry is changing rapidly. Yesterday, the producer sold to the gathering company, the gathering company sold to the pipeline company, the pipeline company sold, processed, stored, and moved the gas to the end user. Today, the end user buys from the producer, the gatherer, pipeliner, processor, storer. All handle someone else’s gas. There is only one way to know the quality of your product. Take a representative sample. Since everything that is done to gas changes it, you must know its’ quality as it is produced, compressed, processed, stripped, stored, and sold. This takes an analysis of that collected representative sample. Your company’s sampling techniques determine that gas quality. The people involved and the equipment used to collect the sample, store, transport, condition, and analyze that sample all make a profound difference. This paper will cover all of the aspects of gas quality determination and the business impacts of sampling accuracy. The issues discussed include: where on the line should the sample be taken, how should it be taken to protect its’ quality, what about transportation, D.O.T., cylinders, what happens to the gas in that cylinder, conditioning in the lab, heating, cooling, manifolds, and analyzers. Each step in the sampling operation will be discussed, as well as the ramifications of errors involved. This paper will also cover recent tests involving spot sampling test to maintain phase control and data from continuing test of composite samplers.