Development of analytical design equation for gas pipelines

Based on the mass and momentum balance, a rigorous analytical equation is derived for compressible fluid flow in pipelines. This equation gives a functional relationship between flow rate, inlet pressure and outlet pressure, and is very useful in design calculations where any of these variables need to be estimated if the others are given. It can be used for any pipeline topology and configuration, including size and orientation. A number of problems of engineering importance are studied using this equation. They include, bottom-hole pressure calculations in gas wells, gas injection calculations and long-distance gas pipeline design calculations. The excellent agreement between predicted results and field data, using this equation for this wide variety of problems and conditions, demonstrate the efficacy of this equation for engineering applications. Simple computer programs, in both FORTRAN and BASIC, are developed to handle these applications. The BASIC program can be run on any programmable calculator with 3K memory.