Speed Control of PIG Flow in Natural Gas Pipeline

천연가스배관 내 피그흐름의 속도제어

This paper introduces a simple nonlinear adaptive control method for pipeline inspection gauge (PIG) flow in natural gas pipeline. The dynamic behavior of the PIG depends on the different pressure across its body and the bypass flow through it. The system dynamics includes: dynamics of driving gas flow behind the PIG, dynamics of expelled gas in front of the PIG, and dynamics of the PIG. The method of characteristics (MOC) and Runger-Kuta method are used to solve the dynamics of flow. The PIG velocity is controlled through the amount of bypass flow across its body. A simple nonlinear adaptive controller based on the backstepping method is introduced. To derive the controller, three system parameters should be measured: the PIG position, its velocity and the velocity of bypass flow across the PIG body. The simulation has been done with a pipeline segment in the KOGAS low pressure system, Ueijungboo-Sangye line to verify the effectiveness of the proposed controller. Three cases of interest are considered: the PIG starts to move at its launcher, the PIG arrives at its receiver and the PIG restarts after stopping in the pipeline by obstruction. The simulation results show that the proposed nonlinear adaptive controller attained good performance and can be used for controlling the PIG velocity.