El 

Maghraby et al. Journal of Engineering

Journal of Engineering and Applied Science (2022) 69:66
https://doi.org/10.1186/s44147-022-00126-z and Applied Science

RESEARCH Open Access

Controlling hydrocarbon dew point

and water dew point of natural gas using Aspen
HYSYS
M. A. El Maghraby1*, N. A. El Moniem2 and Amr Abdelghany2 

*Correspondence:
marwa.maghraby93@gmail.com Abstract 
1
Engineering for Petroleum A great attention is subjected to the environmentally friendly natural gas. Compared to
and Process Industries, ENPPI, other fossil fuels, natural gas is a cleaner burning due to the lower emission of carbon
Cairo, Egypt dioxides into the air. Removal of associated hydrocarbons from natural gas streams
2
Chemical Engineering
Department, Faculty plays an important role to sell and to achieve the pipeline specification of natural gas.
of Engineering, Cairo University, To satisfy the specification of pipelines, the hydrocarbon dew point and water dew
Cairo, Egypt point of natural gas must be controlled below the pipeline operating conditions to
prevent many problems: two-phase flow and hydrate formation in the system. The
main purpose of this paper is to simulate the gas plant process to study the effect
of natural gas composition and changing in differential pressure of Joule–Thomson
expansion valve on the obtained values of hydrocarbon, water dew points, and cri-
condentherm temperature.
The results of process simulation using Aspen HYSYS have shown that the control
of hydrocarbon dew point, water dew point, and cricondentherm of natural gas is
achieved through increasing the Joule-Thomson valve differential pressure. There is an
inverse relation between increasing Joule-Thomson valve differential pressure (∆p) and
hydrocarbon dew point, water dew point, and cricondentherm to meet the specifica-
tion of gas pipeline transmission. Increasing differential pressure (∆p) from 14 bar to 24
bar causes a decrease in hydrocarbon dew point, water dew point from −1 to −26°C
and from 0 to −18°C, respectively. Cricondentherm is also decreased from 4 to −12°C
by increasing differential pressure (∆p) from 14 to 24 bars. The operating conditions
at differential pressure below 14 bar is not advisable because cricondentherm tem-
perature does not meet the specification of gas pipeline transmission and hence lead
to many problems. Careful adjustment of the operating conditions of gas processing
plant is very important by making such simulations to choose the optimum operating
conditions which meet gas pipeline transmission.
Keyword:  Natural gas, Process simulation, Control, Hydrocarbon dew point, Water
dew point, Cricondentherm

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El Maghraby et al. Journal of Engineering and Applied Science (2022) 69:66 Page 2 of 10

Introduction
The production of natural gas and derivatives play an extremely important role in
Egypt. Natural gas consumption is about 53% of the total energy used. Gas total pro-
duction peak was in 2020 that reached an average rate of 85 BCM/year produced from
three areas in Egypt which are Nooros field, West Delta Deep Marine, and Zohr. Cur-
rently in 2022, Egypt has three areas of production of natural gas which are Nooros
field, West delta deep marine, and Zohr. In 2027, it is expected that gas production
will be produced from two areas which are West Nile Delta and Zohr. Natural gas is
used in various sectors such as electricity, industry, petroleum, residential, and CNG
(compressed natural gas) sectors. The electricity sector is the largest gas consumer, as
natural gas consumption reached 62.3% of the total local gas consumption. The indus-
try sector consumes around 22.5% of the total local gas consumption. The petroleum
sector consumes about 10.1% of total local consumption. After that, the residential
and CNG sectors come at the least sectors that consume natural gas which reached
5.1% of total local natural gas consumption [1–4].
Natural gas, a highly efficient form of energy, produces a lot of energy and emits
fewer pollutants than many other energy sources. It has an increasing demand to pro-
vide energy in heating homes, cooking food, and generating electricity. It is consid-
ered as a source of hydrocarbon needed in petrochemical feedstocks. It also provides
the main ingredients for such varied products as plastics, fertilizers, anti-freezes,
and fabrics [5, 6]. Industrial consumers get advantages from operating natural gas
combined heat and power (CHP) and combined cooling, heat, and power (CCHP)
systems, similar to those used in commercial settings. Natural gas has different com-
positions depending on the well type and location [5]. Natural gas is formed from
methane mainly and smaller amounts of ethane, propane, butane, and heavier hydro-
carbons along with varying amounts of water vapors, carbon dioxide, sulfur com-
pounds, and other non-hydrocarbons [7]. Ethane, propane, and butane are known as
associated gases or (NGL) [8–12]. They have a variety of different purposes including
the improvement of oil recovery in oil wells, providing raw materials for oil refiner-
ies or petrochemical plants, and as sources of energy. These NGL components must
be recovered to control the dew point of the natur​al gas stream and also to earn rev-
enue by selling out the separated components. Refrigeration is applied using a direct
expansion Joule-Thomson technique or turboexpander to control the dew point
of both water and hydrocarbons of natural gas in order to improve gas quality and
satisfy the specification of pipelines to obtain saleable and useful energy forms to
be used in a wide variety of applications [11–14]. The hydrocarbon liquid dropout
causes some difficulties in gas transmission systems including the increase in pressure
drop, reducing in line capacity and some equipment problems [15, 16]. Avoiding liq-
uid dropout, the operating current specifications of gas transmission lines require to
be operated above the hydrocarbon dew point or cricondentherm temperature. The
achievable control of hydrocarbon dew point and water dew point depends on the
differential pressure available and the composition of the feed gas. In industry, there
are many widely applied different methods used for hydrocarbon dew point control.
Joule-Thomson (J-T) expansion technique is the most preferable method rather than
mechanical refrigeration if enough pressure is available [17].
 El Maghraby et al. Journal of Engineering and Applied Science (2022) 69:66 Page 3 of 10

Table 1  Pipeline specifications of natural gas [11]

Parameter Pipeline specifications

Water dew point, °C < 0 @ 70 bars

Hydrocarbon dew point, °C < 5 @ 70 bars
Cricondentherm, °C <5
Gross calorific value, BTU/SCF > 1000

Table 2  Feed compositions of different wells (C1 and C2) of natural gas
C1, mass % C2, mass %

N2 0.20 0.05
CO2 0.70 0.46
Methane 60.00 61.27
Ethane 5.00 5.49
Propane 3.92 6.48
i-Butane 2.00 3.16
n-Butane 1.51 2.77
C5 6.50 1.25
C6+ 13.77 15.00
H2O 6.00 3.66
Methanol 0.40 0.40

This work aims to simulate the gas processing plant in order to illustrate the optimum
operating conditions using Joule–Thomson expansion technique. The effect of feed com-
position of natural gas and changing in Joule–Thomson valve differential pressure (∆p)
on hydrocarbon dew point, water dew point, and cricondentherm temperature is stud-
ied to meet the specification of pipeline gas transmission Table 1.

Methods
Gases, coming from the wells located in North Nile Delta, contain mainly methane and
other hydrocarbons. The feed composition of two wells (C1 and C2) are listed in Table 2.
Aspen HYSYS steady-state simulation software version 11 is used to study the effect of
different process variables on hydrocarbon dew, water dew point, and cricondentherm in
the gas processing plant and choose the optimum process condition. The selected physi-
cal property package for the HYSYS model developed is the Peng-Robinson Equation-
of-State [18, 19]. The gas processing plant is shown in Fig. 1 and described as follows:

Plant general description

– Gas streams from the wells are gathered and delivered to the inlet manifold, and
methanol solution is injected to prevent hydrate buildup at low temperatures [20].
– Gases, condensate, and produced water are separated in three-phase separator.
– Gases are treated in a low temperature separation train which contains gas/gas heat
exchanger for cooling, Joule–Thomson (J-T) valve for reducing pressure and a low
El Maghraby et al. Journal of Engineering and Applied Science (2022) 69:66 Page 4 of 10

Fig. 1  Gas plant block flow diagram [15]

temperature three-phase separator to separate the condensate liquid, water, and sale
gas.
– Sale gas stream is then recycled to the heat exchanger to cool the feed gas and col-
lected the sale gas as the main product with certain conditions.
– Condensate is stabilized via a two-stage condensate stabilization unit, stored in
tanks, and exported via pumps and pipeline to the national condensate grid.
– Produced water is degassed and stored in tanks where it is transported by trucks to a
safe disposal.
– The actual plant inlet pressure varies from 51 bars to 66 bars related to the required
Joule–Thomson valve differential pressure to ensure high quality of sales gas.

Results and Discussion
The results are divided into four main parts: the first part studies the effect of chang-
ing differential pressure of Joule–Thomson expansion valve on the specifications of the
natural gas such as hydrocarbon dew point, water dew point, and cricondentherm tem-
perature using composition (C1). The second part illustrates the effect of compositions
(C1and C2) of wells on hydrocarbon dew point, water dew point, and cricondentherm.
The third part includes the mass balance of LTS train for different feed gas compositions.
The fourth part explains the effect of Joule–Thomson valve differential pressure on sale
gas gross calorific value using different compositions of natural gas. The conditions of
each stream of LTS train are obtained using Aspen HYSYS and the block flow diagram
of the gas processing plant is previously shown in Fig. 1.

Effect of Joule–Thomson valve differential pressure (∆p) on the specifications of natural gas

using composition (C1)
Effect of (J‑T) valve differential pressure (∆p) on hydrocarbon dew point of natural gas
Hydrocarbon dew point plays an important role in the specifications of gas pipeline
transmission. Hydrocarbon dew point is the temperature at which the condensation of
natural gas occurs when it is cooled at constant pressure [15]. It is necessary to control
 El Maghraby et al. Journal of Engineering and Applied Science (2022) 69:66 Page 5 of 10

the hydrocarbon dew point for economical, operational, and safety reasons [20]. The feed
of natural gas composition used is from well (1), C1. The effect of differential pressure
(∆p) of Joule–Thomson expansion valve on hydrocarbon and water dew points obtained
from the process simulation using HYSYS is shown in Fig.  2. There is an inverse rela-
tion between increasing in ∆p and the values of hydrocarbon dew point and water dew
point. Increasing ∆p from 12 bars to 25 bars causes a decrease in hydrocarbon dew point
from −1 to −26.5°C which normally indicates a lower proportion of heavy hydrocarbon
components included in this composition of natural gas. This is an important parameter
for pipeline transmission specifications. If the natural gas contains a high proportion of
heavy hydrocarbons, there is a greater risk of liquid condensate forming in the pipelines.
These condensates cause an increase in pressure drop and introduce operational prob-
lems resulting from a two-phase formation. These condensates can cause harmful dam-
age such as blockage of pipelines.

Effect of (J‑T) valve differential pressure (∆p) on water dew point of natural gas
Water dew point is the temperature at which water vapor begins to condensate. Control-
ling water dew point of gas prevents the condensation and accumulation of water at low
points in the pipelines. The water dew point specification is usually achieved by remov-
ing water vapor from the process gas plant stream using different dehydrations or other
technologies. Methanol is used as hydrate inhibitor and applied in sufficient quantities.
The injected inhibitor absorbs water in the gas to prevent freezing or hydrate formation.
The effect of the Joule–Thomson valve differential pressure (∆p) is estimated in Fig. 2.

Fig. 2  Effect of (J–T) valve differential pressure (∆p) on hydrocarbon dew point, water dew point, and
cricondentherm using composition of natural gas, (C1)
El Maghraby et al. Journal of Engineering and Applied Science (2022) 69:66 Page 6 of 10

It is clear that increasing the differential pressure obtained from J–T expansion from 14
bars to 24 bars causes a reduction in water dew point from 0 to −18°C which meet the
specification of pipeline transmission.

Effect of (J‑T) valve differential pressure (∆p) on cricondentherm temperature of natural gas
Cricondentherm can be defined as the maximum temperature at which liquids and
vapors can coexist. One phase is present at any pressure at higher temperatures than
cricondentherm. The liquid–vapor boundary terminates at a critical point with a critical
temperature and critical pressure. By simulating the effect of Joule–Thomson valve dif-
ferential pressure (∆p) on the cricondentherm temperature as shown in Fig. 2, it is found
that increasing differential pressure (∆p) from 14 bars to 24 bars causes a reduction in
cricondentherm temperature from 4 to −12°C. This means that operating at values of
differential pressure (∆p) lower than 13 bars is not safe because cricondentherm records
values greater than 5°C which does not meet gas pipeline transmission.

Effect of different compositions of natural gas on hydrocarbon dew point, water dew point,
and cricondentherm
The results of this part illustrate the effect of different compositions of natural gas
obtained from wells. Gas compositions mentioned in Table 2 contains well 1 (C1) and
well 2 (C2) with various concentrations of different components. The results are given
in Figs. 3, 4, and 5. It is obvious that hydrocarbon dew point, water dew point, and cri-
condentherm are affected by changing the composition of natural gas. A natural gas with
a certain composition (C1) listed in Table 2 gives lower values of hydrocarbon dew point
and cricondentherm compared to these values obtained using natural gas with composi-
tion (C2) which contains more heavier hydrocarbons C ­ 6+. This result explained as fol-
lows: increasing the concentration of heavier hydrocarbons, especially C ­ 6+ causes an
increase of hydrocarbon dew point which is very sensitive to the specific components
of the gas stream and is strongly influenced by the concentration of the heavier hydro-
carbons. The results listed in Table 3 shows that at differential pressure (∆p) equals to

Fig. 3  Effect of (J–T) valve differential pressure (∆p) on hydrocarbon dew point using different composition
of natural gas, C1 and C2
 El Maghraby et al. Journal of Engineering and Applied Science (2022) 69:66 Page 7 of 10

Fig. 4  Effect of (J–T) valve differential pressure (∆p) on water dew point using different composition of
natural gas, C1 and C2

Fig. 5  Effect of (J-T) valve differential pressure (∆p) on cricondentherm using different composition of natural
gas, C1 and C2

Table 3 Hydrocarbon dew point, water dew point, and cricondentherm using different
compositions (C1 and C2)
C1 C2

J–T valve differential pressure, (∆p), bar 15 15

Hydrocarbon dew point, °C −4.0 −2.0
Water Dew Point, °C −1.2 −1.80
Cricondentherm, °C 0.50 1.0

15 bars, the estimated values of hydrocarbon dew point, water dew point, and cricond-
entherm using composition (C1) are −4.0°C, −1.2°C, and 0.5°C, respectively, whereas
those obtained using composition (C2) are −2.0°C, −1.80°C, and 1.0°C, respectively. All
these results meet pipelines specification of natural gas transmission.
El Maghraby et al. Journal of Engineering and Applied Science (2022) 69:66 Page 8 of 10

Table 4  Mass balance of low temperature separation train streams

Feed gas Sales gas Condensate
C1, mass % C2, mass % C1, mass % C2, mass % C1, mass % C2, mass %

N2 0.24 0.07 0.24 0.07 0.00 0.00

CO2 0.93 0.56 0.95 0.58 0.14 0.10
Methane 80.66 75.51 82.77 77.35 4.62 5.33
Ethane 6.24 6.79 6.38 6.92 2.05 2.63
Propane 4.33 7.37 4.38 7.43 5.04 9.77
i-Butane 1.85 3.23 1.84 3.19 5.26 10.23
n-Butane 1.48 2.67 1.44 2.60 5.94 11.84
C5+ 2.87 2.49 2 1.84 76.89 60.00
H2O 0.35 0.33 0.00 0.01 0.00 0.00
Methanol 1.05 0.97 0.00 0.01 0.05 0.10

Table 5  Conditions of low temperature separator train unit

Feed gas Sales gas Condensate
C1 C2 C1 C2 C1 C2

Vapor fraction 0.99 0.99 1.00 1.00 0 0

Temperature, °C 30.72 30.67 0.62 2.00 0.62 2.00
Pressure, bar 51.00 50.89 35.97 36.77 35.97 36.77
Molar flow, kg mole/h 2692.34 2801.5 2675.6 2783.36 9.11 10.34
Mass flow, kg/h 48783.57 52802.52 47918.75 51928.34 605.08 608.91
Liquid volume flow, m3/h 151.36 160.32 150.12 159.03 0.98 1.03

Mass Balance of LTS Train

Mass balance of each stream of low temperature separation train unit is listed in Table 4
for each composition C1 and C2. The conditions of each stream are listed in Table 5.

Effect of (J–T) valve differential pressure on sale gas gross calorific value using different
composition of natural gas, C1 and C2
Gross calorific value of sale gas ranges from 1092 Btu/SCF to 1078.5 Btu/SCF using
composition C1 whereas it varies from 1137 Btu/SCF to 1122 Btu/SCF using composi-
tion C2 as ∆p increases from 12 bar to 25 bar. These values meet the specification of sale
gas listed in Table 1.

Conclusions
The hydrocarbon and water dew points may cause concerns in gas pipelines during trans-
portation. The problem comes from the possibility of liquid condensation in pipelines,
leading to issues in metering, pressure drop, and safe operation. It must be controlling
hydrocarbon dew point, water dew point, and cricondentherm to meet the specification
of pipelines and avoid various problems. Hydrocarbon dew point is a function of gas
composition and pressure. The natural gas composition includes the lighter hydrocar-
bons that reduce the values of hydrocarbon dew point and vice versa. Controlling water
 El Maghraby et al. Journal of Engineering and Applied Science (2022) 69:66 Page 9 of 10

dew point can be achieved by elimination of water condensation through pipelines. It

is necessary to control the dew points to be below the pipeline operating conditions to
prevent two-phase flow and hydrate formation in the system. Natural gas process simu-
lation is very important to get the optimum operating condition that meet the specifica-
tion of the pipeline as follows: hydrocarbon dew point lower than 5°C at pressure < 70
bars and water dew point equals 0 at 70 bars. Lower values of hydrocarbon dew point,
water dew point, and cricondentherm temperature are obtained using raw natural gas
composition contains lower content of heavier hydrocarbons whereas the presence of
heavier hydrocarbon causes an increase in the hydrocarbon dew point. Also, the optimal
operation conditions to meet the specification of pipelines are obtained at differential
pressure (∆p) of Joule–Thomson ranging from 14 to 24 bars.

Abbreviations
BCM Billion cubic meter unit
BTU British thermal unit
CNG Compressed natural gas
CHP Combined heat and power
CCHP Combined cooling, heat, and power
NGL Natural gas liquids
J-T Joule–Thomson
LTS Low temperature separation
SCF Standard cubic feet

Acknowledgements
The authors acknowledge Cairo University, for providing support and for funding the publication of the paper. The
authors also acknowledge the Process Department at ENPPI (engineering for petroleum and process industries), for the
support provided during the methodology phase.

Authors’ contributions
MA wrote up the manuscript and conducted the HYSYS results. NA and AR supervised the HYSYS results, edited, read,
and approved the final manuscript. The authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Authors’ information
Prof. Nabil Mahmoud Abdel Monem is currently a professor of Chemical Engineering Department at Faculty of Engineer-
ing, Cairo University. Dr. Amr Refay Abdelghany is an associate professor of Chemical Engineering Department at Faculty
of Engineering, Cairo University. Eng. Marwa Ahmed El Maghraby is currently a process engineer at ENPPI (Engineering
for Petroleum and Process Industries Company).

Funding
Funding was obtained from Cairo University.

Availability of data and materials

The datasets supporting the conclusions of this article are included within the article.

Declarations
Competing interests
The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Received: 18 May 2022 Accepted: 26 July 2022

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