Development of a Scheme for Mixing Butane with Air for Gas Supply to Consumers

One of the promising development areas of gas supply systems is supplying butane-based air-and-gas mixtures to consumers. Butane-and-air mixture is fully adaptable to natural gas, tak-ing into account the requirements for the interchangeability of combustible gases. However, we need to solve the problems of determining the mixture composition and developing a scheme for mixing butane with air taking into account the physical and chemical properties of butane that govern its operating at low inlet pressures providing a constant supply of source gas for mixing from an underground tank regardless of the climatic features in the region. De-veloping well-founded recommendations to obtain a mixture of butane with air will ensure the widespread introduction of such systems into the gas supply practice and enhance the uninter-rupted operation of gas supply systems when using alternative combustible gases. On the basis of our research, we suggested a scheme for producing a mixture of butane with air using a dosing valve to ensure a constant supply of butane from an underground tank with alternating extraction of vapor and liquid gas phases and feeding the gas phase for mixing at the recommended pressure. We recommended a composition of butane-and-air mixture that meets the requirements of gas interchangeability and the maximum speed of flame propaga-tion in gas burners during combustion. Applying the scheme for producing a butane-and-air mixture of the recommended composition will allow to expand the possibility of gas supply to consumers when using alternative fuels, to relieve peak loads when supplying natural gas, and to ensure redundancy of gas supply systems for strategically important utility facilities.