In the US the University of North Dakota (UND) has begun a demonstration project to determine the viability of generating power using a 30kw microturbine fueled with the sour (impure) natural gas often produced along with oil.
The project is being overseen by UND’s Energy & Environmental Research Centre (EERC) and will be run in an Amerada Hess field that produces a sour gas containing 1.5% sulfur.
“The turbine has 30kw of power capacity now, with the potential of producing 300 kilowatts from a sour gas pipeline in the future, which would provide significant cost savings,” said Darren Schmidt, EERC research manager.
“There is a large volume of sour gas around the country that is not readily marketable because of quality or quantity constraints. By utilizing this by-product natural gas, there is a dual benefit of generating on-site power for oil recovery while at the same time minimizing emissions by as much as 75%,” said EERC associate director of research John Harju.
The project will determine whether the turbine can operate when exposed to the high-sulfur conditions existing in the field.
