Chapter 30 • Centrifugal Pumps: Required Starting NPSH 237

• But 0.349 ft2

! 0:349  144 in:2
! 50:25 in:2
 50 in:2

Thus the required starting NPSH will be given by:

Force required to accelerate the liquid in the line from 0 to 10 ft/s divided by the open
cross-sectional area of the pipe.

216:4 ½M½L½T2
poundal  lbwt
50 ½L 2
1 2
! 4:328 psi ½M½L ½T

Note 2.31 ft of water  1 psi

∴ The required starting NPSH ¼ 4.328 psi  2.31 (ft of water)/psi
! 9.997 ft of water
Required Starting NPSH ! 10 ft of water, to avoid cavitation on start-up.

Suction Pressure Control

I was working in Colombia in January of 2018, starting up an oil field vacuum, water degas-
sing tower. Waste water from a crude tower production well was saturated with corrosive
CO2. I had designed a packed tower 100 ID and 300 T-T to flash off the CO2 at a vacuum of
2500 Hg (125 mm Hg).
The bottom half of the vessel was sized for a water hold-time of 5 min, to protect the
bottom water pumps from cavitation due to low level. And, to prevent the water level from
backing up into the packed bed, which could cause flooding.
As was my usual practice, I indicated on my design vessel sketch, the bottom level tap 600
above the vessel’s bottom tangent line. I showed that the height of the vessel skirt was located
130 above the elevation of the center line of the bottoms pumps. The objective was to provide
the pumps’ required NPSH, which was 120 , at a minimum liquid level in the tower.
I’ve designed hundreds of process vessels using this criterion. But in this case, some-
thing had gone wrong. The bottom level tap was located 10 ft above the tangent line. To
control the bottom level, the Colombian operators had to hold the water level perilously
close to the packed bed. Too high a level would cause the packed bed to flood.
As the lower level tap was so badly mislocated, I decided to abandon the use of level
control entirely and rely on “Suction Pressure Control” for the bottom’s pump.
My client (Ecopetrol) always designs pumps with a pressure transmitter at the pump
suction, to alert unit operators about impending pump cavitation due to loss of liquid
level. I connected this pressure transmitter output to the Level Control Valve on the
pump’s discharge line.
238 UNDERSTANDING PROCESS EQUIPMENT FOR OPERATORS AND ENGINEERS

FIG. 30.6 Pump suction pressure control eliminates discharge level control valve and level taps on pressure vessel.

As the required pump NPSH was 12 ft, I decided to set the pump suction pressure to
provide six extra feet of extra head. That is, 18 ft of head. One inch of Hg is equal to about
1.2 ft of warm water. Therefore:
180  1:2 ¼ 1500 Hg (30.5)

The vacuum degassing tower operated at 2500 Hg vacuum, my set-point pressure would be:
2500 Hg  1500 Hg ¼ 1000 Hg vacuum (30.6)

Actually, I lied about the above calculation. What I really did was to manually lower the
suction pressure until the pump cavitated a little. Then, I set the suction pressure about 500
Hg higher. All done without reference to the actual tower water level, which was below the
lower level tap, and hence not visible.
I checked the ambient temperature 102°F. Not a cloud in the sky. I recall thinking, “I’m
getting too old for this stuff. But, I do love it.”
Does this mean level control for pump’s suction is an engineering error? Yes! Use suc-
tion pressure control—at least for vacuum tower service (see Fig. 30.6).
In addition to the oppressive heat, I ran into another problem on this job. The pump’s
suction screen was located downstream of the sensing point for the pressure transmitter.
So, when the suction screen plugged during that night, the pump began to cavitate due to
loss of suction pressure.
The next morning, I revised the suction screen with larger openings. The lesson is that
when retrofitting a pump to suction pressure control, the suction pressure sensing point
must be located downstream of the suction screen and never upstream.
 Chapter 30 • Centrifugal Pumps: Required Starting NPSH 239

Pump Suction Screens

I was starting up the new well water vacuum deaerator I had designed for the oil field dril-
ling operation in Colombia. The bottoms pumps were rated for a low head and 60,000 BSD.
I had thought the recycled well water was clean. But, this was a mistake. The pump’s suc-
tion screen located in the 1200 intake line was a cone covered with a fine mesh. It became
over 90% plugged after only 12 h of operation.
But why do we have pump suction screens? Are they really necessary?
Maybe yes. Maybe no. It all depends.
First, each centrifugal pump has a “Maximum Free Passage” specification. It’s the
clearance between the impeller and the pump case. That is typically a few tenths of an
inch. I would specify that the openings of the suction screen at perhaps half of this value
or a bit less.
A more critical value is the maximum particle size that the pump’s mechanical seal can
tolerate. The tolerable particle size is likely to be very small. This criterion only applies for
“self-flushed” pumps, which means that the seal flush fluid is a tiny slip-stream drawn
from the pump discharge line and then through a restriction orifice.
My plan was to change the pump suction screen, by replacing the fine mesh with a
cone with quarter inch holes. This ¼00 hole being smaller than the pump’s maximum free
passage shown on the pump data sheet.
To protect the pump’s double mechanical seal (an expensive $60,000 (United States)
item) from having its seal faces scratched with particulates, I disconnected the discharge
water flow to the seal. Then, I connected to the half inch fitting, via stainless tubing, pota-
ble water which was available at the control room, which appeared to be clean.
Incidentally, this problem could have been avoided by using a “Packed Pump” rather
than the more expensive Double-Mechanical Seal for a water pumping service. Packed
pumps will unavoidably suffer from leaks along the shaft, and thus are not suitable for
hydrocarbon or chemical plant service. However, when just pumping clean water, the
extra expense and the extra maintenance complexity of a mechanical seal serve no
purpose.
After several months, there has been no report of an increase in the pump’s suction
screen pressure drop, so I suppose all’s well that ends well.
 31
How Compressors Work

The people I work with in refineries are most often honest, ethical, dedicated, and con-
fused. It is the complexity of the process equipment that is the origin of the confusion.
And, the most confusing sort of process equipment is compressors.
There are three sorts of compressors that I have worked with:
• Centrifugal
• Axial
• Reciprocating
To determine your own CI (i.e., Confusion Index), please take the following test:
• Question #1—A motor-driven centrifugal compressor which is running at a constant
speed, at a constant volume of gas flow and temperature at the suction, and at a
constant suction and discharge pressure. The molecular weight of the gas now
increases from 20 to 40. What happens to the motor’s amp load?
• Answer #1—There is no answer. Both the suction and discharge pressure (i.e., the
compression ratio) cannot be kept the same. Why? Because the machine is developing
a fixed amount of head or feet. The pressure ratio is a function of the molecular weight
of the gas. So, if the molecular weight goes up, so must the compression ratio. Either the
suction pressure is drawn down or the discharge pressure is pushed up, or both.
• Question #2—Same as above, except now I will permit the suction pressure to drop due
to the larger molecular weight. The discharge pressure is still kept constant. What now
happens to the motor amps?
• Answer #2—The amps go up. Not because the heavier, higher molecular weight gas is
harder to compress. Just the opposite is true. Fifty-eight molecular weight butane
requires 15% less amps to compress than 16 molecular weight methane, for a certain
volume of gas. The amps on the motor increases, because the compression ratio
(discharge pressure divided by the suction pressure) has increased, even though the
compressibility factor (Z) has dropped by 15% for butane, as compared to methane.
• Question #3—A reciprocating compressor, running at a fixed speed with a motor driver,
handling a fixed volume of gas, and with both the suction and discharge pressures
constant, is compressing methane (16 MW). It now switches to compressing propane
(44 MW). What happens to the motor amps?
• Answer #3—The amp load goes down by about 10%. Why? Because “Z” the
compressibility factor of the gas goes down by 10%.
• Question #4—For a variable speed centrifugal compressor, if I need to keep both the
suction and discharge pressure constant, and the suction volume and suction
temperature are constant, and the molecular weight of the gas is increasing, should I:

Understanding Process Equipment for Operators and Engineers. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-816161-6.00031-X 241

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242 UNDERSTANDING PROCESS EQUIPMENT FOR OPERATORS AND ENGINEERS

A. Slow down the compressor.

B. Speed up the compressor.
C. Varying the speed has no effect.
• Answer #4—Slowing the compressor will off-set the effect on greater gas molecular
weight or gas density. This can be done with a variable frequency AC motor driver
(i.e., VFD).
If you have missed all four questions, your “Confusion Index” is 100%. Congratulations.
Best to read on.

Centrifugal vs Axial Compressors

The only Axial Compressor I have worked with was a giant Air Compressor at the Mara-
thon FCU in Garyville, Louisiana. Along the shaft there were dozens of spinning blades.
These blades accelerated the air.
Along the interior of the compressor case, there were also dozens of blades that were
stationary. These blades converted the kinetic energy of the air, derived from the spinning
shaft, into feet of head. To convert from feet of head to pressure increase:
Increase in air pressure ðin psiÞ ¼ K  Hp (31.1)

where:
• K ¼ a coefficient proportional to the air density that converts feet of polytropic head
to pressure
• Hp ¼ feet of polytropic head
The important thing to understand about both axial and centrifugal compressors is they
both develop the same feet of head, regardless of the density of the gas being compressed.
If the air gets hotter, because it’s summer time in Louisiana, then the discharge pressure
from the Axial Air Compressor drops off, but the feet of head developed remains constant.
Thus, if the air blower discharge pressure was too high in the winter, we could:
• Throttle on the suction.
• Slow the blower’s speed.
• Get the axial air compressor’s blades really dirty, as happened at the Marathon plant
in Garyville.

Centrifugal Compressors
Fig. 31.1 shows a picture of a centrifugal compressor’s rotating assembly. Instead, of blades
spinning around a shaft, there are wheels. The wheels impart kinetic energy to the gas
from the rotational energy of the wheels. As the gas escapes from each wheel, it flows into
a circular stationary chamber called the “Stator.” Inside the stator, the gas slows. And, the
kinetic energy imparted to the gas from the wheel is converted into feet of head. To convert