Fluenta’s gas measurement solution chosen by Bechtel in Atlantic’s LNG facility, located in Trinidad and Tobago

Bechtel, a renowned Engineering, Procurement, and Construction company, is working with Fluenta to engineer a gas measurement solution for Atlantic, one of the world’s largest Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) producers.   

Fluenta’s gas measurement solution will be installed in Atlantic’s LNG facility, located in Trinidad and Tobago, which presents cryogenic conditions, complex chemical compositions, and non-standard orientations of sensor placements.

Bechtel approached Fluenta, a global leader in the ultrasonic flare gas measurement space, in September 2021.

Fluenta’s US and UK teams worked closely with Bechtel to provide an engineered solution to ensure regulatory compliance and handle the installation’s unique conditions. The deal was formalised in December 2021.

Liquified Natural Gas is a solution to transport and store natural gas, especially where expensive pipeline infrastructure isn’t available or a viable investment. Natural gas is considered a cleaner energy source than coal as it releases around half the amount of CO2 per unit of energy produced.

For this application, Fluenta’s solution includes using FlarePhase™Cryo transducers in a Dual-Path configuration for increased accuracy and redundancy. The transducers are part of the new award-winning FlarePhase™ range, which champions the widest temperature handling capabilities on the market. The Fluenta FlarePhase™ Cryo was explicitly developed to resolve the LNG market’s challenge of measuring flare gas in very low temperatures.

Commenting on the collaboration with Bechtel, Christopher Viramontes, Fluenta’s US Sales Manager, said, “the process of creating liquefied natural gas presents a set of unique challenges such as the tough conditions to purify, liquefy, and transport the natural gas. Taking that into account, together with information provided by Bechtel and Atlantic, we simulated gas flow conditions using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), ensuring most variables are accounted for in our meter’s algorithm for measuring flow velocity before deployment.”

Generally, these transducers can potentially provide flow measurement accuracy of better than ±0.75%, which is well below the currently enforced ±5% and future-proofs against tightening rules.

This level of accuracy further allows for better emission reduction efforts and a cleaner operation, in line with efforts to reduce the advance of climate warming.