Efficiency limits for multiphase pumps

G Morrison, A Patil, D Cihak

Texas A&M University, Mechanical Engineering Department, USA

ABSTRACT

The ideal compression process of multiphase flow varies from isothermal for pure liquid
to isentropic for all gas. Between these two extremes, the gas heat of compression is
partially absorbed by the liquid which can be represented by a polytropic process. The
theoretical performance of multiphase pumps is investigated showing how a pump’s
effectiveness decreases from the all liquid performance as the amount of gas, inlet
pressure, exit pressure, and thermodynamic process are varied. Comparisons are also
made between an isentropic gas compressor and the multiphase pump’s performance.

NOMENCLATURE

Cp Constant pressure specific heat

Cv Constant volume specific heat
GVF Gas Volume Fraction = Qgas/(Qgas+Qliq)
k Ratio of specific heats = Cp/Cv
n Polytropic process exponent value
pin Pump inlet pressure
pout Pump exit pressure
Pcompressor Power imparted to a gas during an isentropic compression
Pdrive Power supplied to operate a pump
Pisentropic Power imparted to fluid mixture during an isentropic compression
Pisothermal Power imparted to fluid mixture during an isothermal compression
Phydraulic Power imparted to an incompressible fluid by a pump
Ppolytropic Power imparted to fluid mixture during a polytropic compression
Ppump Power imparted to fluid mixture during compression
Qgas Gas volumetric flow rate at pump inlet
Qliq Liquid volumetric flow rate at pump inlet
effective Pump effectiveness = Ppump/Phydraulic
mechanical Pump mechanical efficiency = Ppump/Pdrive
process Pump process efficiency = Ppump/Pisentropic
volumetric Volumetric efficiency, actual volumetric flow rate/design flow rate

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1 INTRODUCTION

Multiphase pumps are used by the oil industry to boost production, to reduce installation
costs, maintenance, and size, and to transport mixtures from production sites to gathering
facilities. Production rate and lifetime well production is increased by decreasing the
well bore pressure. This can be accomplished by using a down hole multiphase pump or
a pump at the well head. The down hole pump will have a higher inlet pressure and
lower GVF. The well head pump can be larger with easier installation and maintenance
but will have lower inlet pressures and higher GVF. The selection of which application
is best depends not only upon what type of pump may physically be installed, but how is
the performance of the pump affected by the changes in GVF and inlet pressure. This
performance variation will be investigated in this paper.

Multiphase pumps are being used in ever increasing applications over wider ranges of
gas volume fraction. A single pump can replace a flow separator, pump, and compressor
resulting in lower installation costs, less maintenance and a smaller footprint. There is
currently a desire to use them for gas wells with gas volume fractions exceeding 90%.
Part of the driving force is that gas well can have long periods of very low GVF as liquid
that has collected at the bottom is finally forced to the surface. This slugging affect
increases the difficulty of using a separation system which can withstand the slug and the
possibly large amount of fluid present. The multiphase pump, if properly designed, can
accommodate wide ranging values of GVF. This work presents various methods to
evaluate the performance of multiphase pumps used under these conditions. The flow
rate through the pump may change with GVF, frequently decreasing with increasing
GVF. Therefore, the volumetric efficiency needs to be characterized over the range of
operation so that a pump may be properly sized. This is a function of the pump design
and must be experimentally determined. The theoretical efficiency of the compression
process can be derived for a specific process using thermodynamics. This will represent
the best possible performance of a pump which will decrease due to internal leakage and
friction. However, the analysis is useful to determine if a multiphase pump’s
performance can be adequate for a particular installation. The actual pump would need
to be tested to determine the actual performance. The ideal process can vary from an
isothermal to an isentropic depending upon the GVF present. The isothermal process
will be present for 0% GVF (a standard hydraulic pump) while the maximum theoretical
performance for 100% GVF is isentropic, the same as a compressor. Between these two
extremes, the mixture of liquid and gas interact with the liquid being heated by the heat
generated by the gas compression. The liquid has a high thermal capacitance and will
decrease the temperature rise of the mixture during compression. As the amount of
liquid is decreased (increasing GVF), the ability of the liquid to absorb the gas heat of
compression reduces and the mixture temperature increases. This process can be
represented by a polytropic process.

2 COMPRESSION PROCESS CHARACTERIZATION

The performance of multiphase pumps with a gas phase present is different from a pump
operating with an incompressible fluid or incompressible fluid mixture. This change
varies with the type of pump being utilized. Positive displacement pumps (twin screw,
piston, progressive cavity) can usually handle the gas-liquid mixture providing there is
sufficient liquid to lubricate and seal the pump mechanism. In twin screw pumps where
there is a finite clearance between the screws and the housing, back flow leakage can
become appreciable at high GVF. Rotordynamic pumps (centrifugal, axial) must be
redesigned to prevent vapor lock caused by the separation of the gas and liquid by the

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spinning components of the pump. Sometimes, this affect is used to actually separate the
mixture and route the gas and liquid phase components to devices which are designed for
high GVF and low GVF respectively. For all cases, the pump performance increases as
the gas density increases. This is a result of the higher mixture density being closer to
that of a liquid. The ratio of the inlet to exit density of the mixture increases as the inlet
pressure increases but decreases as the pressure ratio across the pump increases. Hence,
large pump differential pressure and low pump inlet pressure reduce the pump
performance by increasing the amount of density change. Metrics to quantify these
different parameters on the pump performance must be defined and their behavior
studied. Since this work takes the viewpoint of using a pump to compress a multiphase
mixture, one metric is how the ability of the pump to add energy to the fluid passing
through it is affected by changing the gas volume fraction (GVF). The equations to be
presented are based upon ideal thermodynamic processes and represent the best a pump
may achieve. In reality, the pump does not achieve this value due to friction, leakage,
etc. The power imparted to a liquid passing through a pump under ideal conditions is
defined as the hydraulic power. It is used to compare to the best performance a pump
may achieve for the same volumetric flow rate when a multiphase flow is compressed.
Therefore, the standard pump power equation is modified so that the sum of the gas and
liquid volumetric flow rates are used instead of liquid only.

Phydraulic   Qliquid  Qgas   pout  pin  (1)

Here Qliquid and Qgas represent the volumetric flow rates of the liquid and gas components
at the pump inlet, pout is the pump exit pressure and pin is the pump inlet pressure. This
equation is valid for an ideal incompressible adiabatic process. Hence, the value is
incorrect for any case that has gas present. It is a theoretical best case performance of the
pump which is present when the flow is incompressible.

The compression process of a multiphase flow with gas present can vary depending upon
the characteristics of the multiphase flow and the pump. Isothermal power is the power
imparted to a two phase fluid which is compressed in a constant temperature process.
This is common for lower GVF cases where the heat capacitance of the liquid can absorb
the heat generated by the compression of the gas with a negligible rise in the mixture
temperature through the pump.

p 
isothermal  Qliquid  pout  pin   Qgas pin ln  out  (2)
 pin 
The first term is the hydraulic power for only the liquid flow. The second term is the
power for the isothermal compression of the gas flow. The ideal gas law is used in the
derivation of this equation as well as the equations for polytropic processes discussed
later. Therefore pressure and temperature terms must be expressed in absolute values.
Dividing Pisothermal by Phydraulic represents the fraction of energy the pump can impart to a
two phase flow compared to when it is pumping liquid only at the same total volumetric
flow rate and pressure rise. This is a measure of the pumps effectiveness to operate with
a multiphase flow. A value of 1 indicates no performance loss.

As the GVF of the mixture increases, the liquid no longer has enough thermal
capacitance to maintain the mixture temperature constant. This process can be
represented as a polytropic process. The polytropic process represents the compression
process that is somewhere between isothermal (n=1) and isentropic (n=k=Cp/Cv). The
temperature of the mixture increases as it passes through the pump with the highest
temperature rise occurring for an isentropic process. The ideal adiabatic, reversible

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compression process for gasses is the isentropic process and is the upper performance
limit for high GVF cases.

 n 1

n   pout  n
 polytropic  Qliquid  pout  pin   Qgas pin    1 (3)
n 1  p 
 in 
 
For a gas compressor, the ideal compression process is isentropic. The power required
for gas only compression for this process is given below.

 k

k   Pout  k 1 
 compressor  Qgas Pin   1 (4)
k 1  P 
 in  

A typical centrifugal gas compressor has an efficiency (Pcompressor/Pdrive) around 70%

where Pdrive is the power required to operate the compressor. A multiphase pump
operating at 100% GVF will have the same value of the maximum power added
(isentropic process) to the gas for the same operating conditions. However, the
efficiency of the pump (Pcompressor/Pdrive) may be significantly lower. This relationship
will be further discussed.

There are several ways to measure the performance of a multiphase pump. One is to
compare the decreasing ability of the pump to compress liquid as the amount of gas
present increases. A ratio of the power imparted to the multiphase fluid to the power
imparted to a liquid flow based upon the same inlet pressure, pressure rise, and inlet
volumetric flow rate is termed the pump effectiveness. This represents the degradation
of the pump’s ability to impart power to the multiphase fluid compared to liquid only
flow.
 pump
Pump Effectiveness  effective  (5)
 hydraulic
where  pump  isothermal or  polytropic

Since the ideal compression process is isentropic, another measure of a pump’s

performance is the decrease in efficiency when a polytropic process is present compared
to an isentropic compression. The liquid portion of a multiphase flow has a higher
thermal capacitance compared to the gas. Hence, there is significant heat transfer from
the gas to the liquid resulting in a lower temperature rise in the polytropic process
reducing the energy added to the gas. The process efficiency is defined as the ratio of the
actual power imparted to the multiphase fluid to the actual power imparted in an
isentropic process. This represents the upper limit of a pump’s performance capability
based solely upon the thermodynamic process taking place in the pump. Further
degradation of performance is present due to friction and leakage from high to low
pressure regions. The process efficiency is defined by:
 pump
 process  where  isentropic   polytropic for n  k (6)
 isentropic
and  pump   isothermal or  polytropic

Hence, effective represents the change in pump performance based upon liquid pumping
and process represents the change in pump performance compared to an isentropic

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compression. There is discussion whether the isentropic process truly represents the
desired process. The thermodynamic processes discussed include any temperature rise
due to the process and the energy imparted to the fluid by means of internal energy
increase. This is theoretically correct. However, if the temperature rise is not desired
and must be eliminated using a heat exchanger after the compression process, this
internal energy increase is actually wasted energy. Therefore, the actual installation
parameters must be included in the analysis of a multiphase pump or even gas
compressor. The basic definition of efficiency is what you want divided by what it costs.
This can vary for a specific device depending on whether the temperature rise is useful or
must be eliminated. The elimination reduces the useful energy added to the fluid and
increases the installation costs by adding additional equipment to change the fluid
temperature.

A pump must be experimentally investigated to determine these values for the particular
pump under specific conditions since friction and leakage will also be present. Two
additional metrics are needed to quantify these additional affects. One is the mechanical
efficiency of the pump which is defined as the power added to the fluid divided by the
power required to operate the pump.
 pump
 mechanical  (7)
 drive

The final measure of a pump’s performance is its volumetric efficiency. This is usually
applied to positive displacement pumps and is simply the ratio of the actual volumetric
flow rate to the theoretical volumetric flow rate based upon the pump’s geometry and
operating speed. This decrease can be due to compressibility affects and increased
internal leakage as is present in twin screw pumps due to the fixed clearance between the
screws and the pump housing. This is solely dependent upon the specific pump design.
However, it is a very important parameter since it specifies how much a pump’s
volumetric flow rate capacity is affected by the presence of multiphase flow.

This paper will evaluate the theoretical limitations of multiphase pumps with respect to
effectiveness and process efficiency. Experimental results will be shown for a twin
screw pump for the pump effectiveness along with measured volumetric and mechanical
efficiencies to illustrate the affects.

3 RESULTS

Figures 1 and 2 illustrate how the maximum theoretical pump effectiveness varies
between isothermal and isentropic flow for pressure rises of 1, 6, and 100 atm for inlet
pressures of 1 and 100 atm gage. At low inlet pressures, the pump’s ability to add energy
to the multiphase flow decreases linearly from 100% to below 5% with increasing GVF
and pressure rise. The difference between isothermal and isentropic flows decreases as
the pump pressure rise increases. The pump’s effectiveness increases greatly as the inlet
pressure is increased to 100 atm gage (Figure 2). At 1 and 6 atm pressure rise, the
effectiveness is near one and there is little difference between isothermal and isentropic.
For the 100 atm pressure rise, there is still a difference between the two with the
isentropic case being the most effective.

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 Figure 1 Pump effectiveness for pin=1 atm gage comparing isothermal and
isentropic processes for 1, 10, and 100 atm pressure rise.

Figure 2 Pump effectiveness for pin=100 atm gage comparing isothermal and
isentropic processes for 1, 10, and 100 atm pressure rise.

Figures 3 to 5 show these relationships in more detail. The figures consist of stacked
contour plots illustrating how the pump effectiveness changes with GVF, pressure rise,
and the value of n for the polytropic process. These figures illustrate how increasing the
pump inlet pressure greatly increases the pump’s ability to work as a compressor. Even
at high GVF’s, the 100 atm inlet pressure allows the pump to operate at over 75%

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effectiveness. This decreases to below 20% for an inlet pressure of 1 atm. At this low
inlet pressure there is a small dependence upon the value of n, with slight variation
occurring from an isothermal process to an isentropic process. The effects of GVF are
very large at low inlet pressures but decrease significantly with increasing inlet pressure.
These data illustrate that the exact compression process (n value) is a secondary affect
upon the pump’s effectiveness. Inlet pressure is the dominant factor with GVF’s
importance increasing as the pump’s inlet pressure decreases.

Figure 3 Pump effectiveness for polytropic processes for pin= 1 atm gage.

Figure 4 Pump effectiveness for polytropic processes for pin= 10 atm gage.

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 Figure 5 Pump effectiveness for polytropic processes for pin= 100 atm gage.

The other approach to defining a pump’s ability to handle gas is to compare it to an

isentropic process which is the theoretical maximum value. The theoretical process
efficiency of a polytropic compression that is present with a multiphase flow compared to
an isentropic process is presented in Figure 6. This figure shows how the quenching of
the gas by the liquid affects theoretical maximum power added to the fluid. The largest
affect is present for the isothermal process. As the polytropic constant, n, increases from
1 to 1.4 the value of process approaches 100%. At 0% GVF, only liquid is present and
the processes are equal so process has an value of 100%. As the amount of gas increases,
the efficiency decreases. For inlet pressures of 100 atm, the effect of pressure rise and
GVF are minimal. Decreasing the inlet pressure results in process decreasing in value.

Figure 6 Process efficiency for isothermal processes

compared to isentropic processes.

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The dependence upon GVF is greater with larger decreases in process as GVF and the
pressure rise increase and Pin decreases.

More detailed representations of how the process efficiency varies with GVF, pressure
rise, inlet pressure and polytropic process coefficient are shown in Figures 7 to 9. Each
figure is for increasing inlet pressure equal to 1 atm, 10 atm, and 100 atm. The
polytropic coefficient is set at values of n=1, 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, and 1.4. The n=1.4 value is
the isentropic case so the process efficiency is 100% for these cases. At low inlet
pressure (Figure 7) the process efficiency drops from 100% to 70% as the GVF increases
from 0 to 100%. There is a slight decrease as the pressure rise increases. As expected,
the process efficiency increases steadily as n is increased from 1 to 1.4. The 10 atm inlet
pressure results in an increase in process efficiency with dependence upon pressure rise
showing decreasing values from near 100% for 1 atm pressure rise to 70% at 100 atm
pressure rise for isothermal flow (n=1). This pressure rise dependency persists as n is
increased. For the 100 atm inlet pressure, the minimum process efficiency is 90% for
100% GVF and 100 atm pressure rise for the isothermal compression. The value
increases with decreasing GVF, pressure rise and increasing n value. These figures show
that compared to an isentropic compression, the maximum loss in the ability to add
energy to the flow is 30% at 0 and 10 atm inlet pressure decreasing to 10% at 100 atm
inlet pressure. The decision must be made if this decrease in process efficiency is
acceptable such that a multiphase pump can be installed instead of a separator, liquid
pump, and gas compressor. Additionally, if the separated fluid streams are then mixed
into the same pipeline, the resulting process for the entire system will be theoretically the
same as the multiphase pump eliminating any additional energy added to the gas by the
isentropic gas compressor. This observation does not include differences in the
mechanical efficiency difference of a pump and a compressor.

Figure 7 Process efficiency for various polytropic processes for pin=1 atm gage.

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 Figure 8 Process efficiency for various polytropic processes for pin=10 atm gage.

Figure 9 Process efficiency for various polytropic processes for pin=100 atm gage.

An MR200 twin screw multiphase pump has been evaluated at the Turbomachinery
Laboratory at Texas A&M University. This system is powered by a 200 hp motor, has a
capacity of 640 gpm, and includes a liquid recirculation system. Air and water are
separately metered at the pump inlet and the electrical power required to operate the
pump is measured. Figure 10 presents the pump’s effectiveness for an inlet pressure of
6.8 atm gage for pressure rises from 0 to 300 psi (20 atm) and GVF values from 50 to
100%. Three different pump speeds were evaluated from ½ of the design speed to full
speed. The effectiveness of the pump had only a small dependence upon pump speed
and varied from 20 to 65% in the same manner the theoretical values varied. The shape
of the contours are similar to the 10 atm data presented in Figure 4. The main difference
is the maximum measured value is 65% compared to the 100% theoretical value. Some

26 © BHR Group 2012 Multiphase 8

of this difference can be attributed to the actual pump process having friction and leakage
present.

Figure 10 Twin-screw pump effectiveness, measured values for pin=6.8 atm gage.

Figure 11 shows how the volumetric efficiency of the pump varied over the same
operating conditions. At low pump speeds, the back flow leakage is appreciable since
the screws are moving slower for a given pressure rise allowing a larger percentage of the
pump flow capacity to leak back to the inlet. This is an inherent characteristic of twin
screw pumps with fixed clearances between the screws and the pump housing. This
leakage as a percentage of overall flow decreases as the pump speed is increased. At full
speed, the volumetric efficiency is above 70% and even increases as GVF increases.
Overall, the volumetric efficiency increases with increasing pump speed, increasing GVF
and decreasing pressure rise.

Figure 11 Twin screw pump measured volumetric efficiency for pin=6.8 atm gage.

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Figure 12 Twin screw pump measured mechanical efficiency for pin=6.8 atm gage.

The mechanical efficiency of the pump is presented in Figure 12. An isothermal

compression was assumed for this process. At the design pump speed, efficiencies varied
from 25 to 55%. The efficiency decreased as the GVF increased and was relatively
constant with pressure rise. Figure 8 illustrates that a pump efficiency varies from
around 85% at 50% GVF to 75% at 100% GVF for an isothermal flow with 10 atm inlet
pressure. If a gas compressor has a mechanical efficiency of 70%, then multiplying this
by the theoretical process efficiency estimates a mechanical efficiency for the isothermal
process between 60% and 52% for GVF’s varying from 50 to 100% respectively
compared to measured mechanical efficiencies of 55% to 25% for the actual pump.
Values at 50% GVF are comparable but the differences increase rapidly as the GVF is
increased. Further analysis of actual pump is required to fully explain the differences.
These experimental results were presented to provide some insight into the actual
processes compared to the theoretical values which were the major topic of this paper.

4 SUMMARY

The theoretical performance of a multiphase pump is dependent upon inlet pressure,

pressure rise, gas volume fraction, and the thermodynamics of the compression process.
The performance is further influenced by the leakage and friction inside the pump which
can reduce overall efficiency, volumetric flow rate, and which thermodynamic process is
present. The thermodynamic process varies from isothermal to isentropic. The pumps
effectiveness varies from 100% to less than 5% depending upon the inlet pressure,
pressure rise, and gas volume fraction. These values represent the fraction of energy
imparted to the compressible multiphase flow compared to the same flow if it is
incompressible. This states the decrease in the pumps ability to perform. Lower inlet
pressures, higher pressure increases, and higher gas volume fractions all decrease the
pump effectiveness. The inlet pressure and GVF essentially change the density of the
mixture. Anything that reduces the mixture density, decreases the pump effectiveness.
Pump effectiveness is mildly dependent upon which compressible thermodynamic
process is present with the pump operating more effectively for an isentropic process
compared to an isothermal process. The process efficiency shows how the

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thermodynamic process reduces the pump efficiency from the maximum value for an
isentropic flow to a low for an isothermal flow. The process efficiency decreases with
decreasing inlet density and increasing pressure rise. This is similar to the pump
effectiveness but the variations are smaller. The thermodynamic process is above 70%
for an inlet pressure of 1 atm increasing to above 90% for an inlet pressure of 100 atm.

5 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

The authors wish to acknowledge the support provided by Dr. Stuart Scott of Shell
Upstream Americas and Dan Landry of Colfax Pumps.

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