Criteria for the design of waxy crude oil pipelines: maximum pump (horsepower) pressure requirement

A new approach to the design of power-law crude oil pipelines is presented. This method is based on the maximum pressure required in the handling of the power-law crude for normal uninterrupted flow, restarted flow and pressure to break the gel. The method is iterative as the rheology of power-law crudes is highly temperature dependent. This method is an improvement of the conventional oil pipeline design model. this criterion and the conventional method, a waxy crude oil pipeline in the Niger Delta was sized. The results show, among others, that the diameter predicted by this method is smaller than that of the conventional method. Also, for the same diameter the pump capacity and restart pressure requirements of this method are lower.