GERG Project: Development and Setup of a New Combustion Reference Calorimeter for Natural Gases

Natural gas plays an important role for worldwide energy supply. For billing purposes precise metering of volume and superior calorific value are very important. At present, only a few institutions worldwide are able to determine the superior calorific value (SCV) of gases and their mixtures with an uncertainty of less than 0.2%. Calculations of SCV’s of natural gases using the data of ISO 6976 provides a similar uncertainty as experimental approaches. For this reason a GERG (Groupe Europ´een de Recherches Gazi`eres) project was initiated to develop a new reference calorimeter for determining the SCV of flammable gases (natural gases), based on the principle of Rossini for a combustion calorimeter. The purpose of such a reference calorimeter is to determine the SCV of pure gases and gas mixtures with an uncertainty of less than 0.05%. The overall uncertainty budget for the SCV is mainly influenced by the mass determination and temperature measurement. An automated weighing and calibration device is used to measure the mass of the combusted gas with an experimental uncertainty of approx. 0.015%. In addition to the experiment, the flow and temperature field in the calorimeter were simulated. These simulations help to reduce each of the combined uncertainties for the combustion and calibration experiment resulting from the temperature measurement. The determination of the adiabatic temperature rise is performed analytically. The assumptions made by early investigators were carefully reconsidered for the first time. The analysis of the temperature–time curves considers (a) the method of evaluation, (b) the iInterval length of the main period, (c) the location of the heat release during the calibration experiment, and (d) the temperature sensor location.