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CFD STUDY OF SURFACE FLOW AND GAS DISPERSION FROM A SUBSEA GAS
RELEASE

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 Proceedings of the ASME 2014 33rd International Conference on Ocean, Offshore and Arctic Engineering
OMAE2014
June 8-13, 2014, San Francisco, California, USA

OMAE2014-24707

CFD STUDY OF SURFACE FLOW AND GAS DISPERSION FROM A

SUBSEA GAS RELEASE

Qing Qing Pan Jan Erik Olsen*

Department of Energy and Process Engineering, Industrial Process Technology,
Norwegian university of Science and Technology, SINTEF Materials and Chemistry,
Trondheim, Norway Trondheim, Norway

Stein Tore Johansen Mark Reed Lars Roar Sætran

Department of Flow Technology, Department of Marine Department of Energy and
SINTEF Materials and Environmental Monitoring and Process Engineering, Norwegian
Chemistry, Modelling, SINTEF Materials university of Science and
Trondheim, Norway and Chemistry, Technology,
Trondheim, Norway Trondheim, Norway

ABSTRACT water column is illustrated in Figure 1 [1]. Gas degassing into

With increasing subsea oil and gas activities, the safety is
challenged by accidental gas release. This can be caused by
leakage from gas transport pipelines or blowouts from oil and
gas wells. Risk assessment of such events is associated to the
correct prediction of gas flux and gas distribution through the
ocean surface and the resulting surface flows. A quantitative
multiphase CFD model can satisfy such needs. Bubbles can be
tracked by discrete phase model (DPM), using a parcel-based
Lagrangian approach. Capturing the free surface formed by
surfacing bubble plumes can be handled by a volume of fluid
(VOF) model. This constitutes an Eulerian-Lagrangian model
framework combining the DPM and VOF models. The model is
presented and validated by experiments of a gas release in 7 m
deep test basin. Results from modelling and experiments are
consistent.
the atmosphere may cause fire or explosion hazards. The
resulting surface current and loss of buoyancy may destabilize
vessels and platforms operating near the release. Risk
assessment is associated to the correct prediction of the
resulting surface flows, the degassing flux and gas distribution
at the surface. This can be achieved by traditional integral
models for bubble plumes, or more recently developed CFD
models. Cloete et al. [1] presented a detailed study of gas
blowout using an Eulerian-Lagrangian CFD model.

INTRODUCTION
Increasing subsea oil and gas activity and critically long
operation time on many existing pipe lines necessitates
improved methods for risk assessment concerning subsea gas
release. A gas release is caused by well blowouts, pipeline
failure (rupture or leak) or malfunction of subsea processing
equipment. Engebretsen et al. [2] reported several accidental
gas releases in the past years. Figure 1: Schematic of sub-sea gas release; from the release
If a release occurs, gas bubbles will travel to the surface point, through the fully developed plume, to the degassing zone
due to buoyancy. The transport of gas and gas bubbles in the with induced surface flow [1].

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 NOMENCLATURE 1. MODEL DESCRIPTION
CD interphasial drag coefficient A modelling concept based on Lagrangian tracking of
C , C1 , C2 bubble motion and Eulerian equations describing the continuous
constants in the standard k-epsilon model
phases constituted by the ocean and the atmosphere was
Eo the Eötvös number developed by Cloete et al. [1]. This model has later been
F total forces on a single bubble (N) improved by implementing a proper interface restriction for
FPG pressure gradient force on a single bubble (N) turbulence at the ocean surface [3]. The modelling concept is
FB buoyancy force on a single bubble (N) presented in the following chapter.
FD drag force on a single bubble (N)
FTD turbulent dispersion force on a single bubble 1.1. DPM
(N) Bubbles are tracked using the following force balance
Fvirtual mass virtual mass force on a single bubble (N) equation due to Newton's 2nd law, supplemented by a kinematic
g gravitational constant (ms-2) relationship which defines the trajectory of bubbles:
forces exerted on fluid by bubbles per unit dv b F
  FD  FTD  FB  Fgravity  Fvirtual mass  FPG
Fc volume (kg m-1s-2) Fc  FDc  FVc dt mb
 18CD Reb b   f
GB source term of turbulent kinetic energy by 
bdb 2

24

u f  vb  b
g (1)
buoyancy- modified turbulence (kgs-3m-1)
k 2 -2
turbulent kinetic energy (m s )  f  Du f dv b   f Du f
Cv   
mb single bubble mass (kg)  b  Dt dt   b Dt
p pressure (Nm-2) dx b
 vb (2)
Reb bubble Reynolds number dt
Sdamping free surface damping source term of epsilon The terms on the RHS of (1) are bubble drag, turbulent
(kgs-4m-1) dispersion, buoyancy, gravity, virtual mass and convective
uf flow velocity (ms-1) contribution to the pressure gradient force per bubble mass
respectively. The lift force is assumed insignificant for
Vcell control volume (m3) relatively high flow rates [4]. The Tomiyama bubble drag law
vb single bubble velocity (ms-1) for contaminated system (sea water) was used [5]. The virtual
xi coordinate direction mass coefficient Cv is 0.5. The effects of flow turbulence are
reflected by the turbulent dispersion forces on the bubbles
Greek letters embedded in the total drag term. u f in the drag term is the
 volume fraction instantaneous velocity, where the turbulent fluctuations in the
 ij kroenecker delta flow field are modeled by a normally distributed random
 dissipation rate of turb. kinetic energy (m2s-3) number and local turbulence parameters, i.e. ui'  
2
k.
 viscosity (kgm-1s-1) 3
t turbulent viscosity (kgm-1s-1) Bubble-bubble interactions are not considered.
 density (kgm-3)
For shallow plumes, the gas density almost remains
constant. However for deeper plumes, the dramatic increase of
 k ,  constants in the standard k-epsilon model gas density with depth should be considered. Density increases
proportionally with pressure due to the ideal gas law.
L Lagrangian integral time scale (s) M
 arbitrary property b  P b
RT
(3)

where P is pressure; M b is bubble molar mass . R is the gas

Subscripts
b bubble constant, which has the value 8.314 J  K 1mol 1 .
f water phase The bubble size model, accounting for breakup and
g atmosphere phase (continuous gas phase) coalescence mechanisms, was developed by Laux and Johansen
t Turbulence [6], where the bubble size is governed by material properties
and turbulence parameters. The bubble will achieve an
equilibrium diameter given by Calderbank [7] if it resides
sufficiently long at the same flow conditions.

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  /  0.6  b 0.25  C   p    u u  
d beq  C1b0.5   (4)   ui   (  ui u j )       i  j 
 0.4   
2
t x j xi x j   x j xi  
 
Here  is the surface tension between bubble and fluid;  is  g (8)
 Kg
density of water; b is the material viscosity of the gas ; C1 and
C2 are coefficients, here we used C1  4 and C2  200 μm ,


x j  ' '

 ui u j   gi  Fi  
c
1
xi
 g  l  
which is frequently used for gas bubbles. 2
The time evolution of the instantaneous bubble diameter where density and viscosity are volume-averaged properties
d b is balanced by a source term which account for breakup and   k k and     k k .
coalescence. The exchange force from the bubble parcels (coupling to
d  b db  d eq  d b the Lagrangian bubbles) is implemented as follows:
 b b (5)
 rel M b
n

  F
dt
D  Fvirtual mass  dtb
Here  b  b b is the bubble bulk density. The relaxation time mb k 1 t f
F c
 rel is controlled by the speed of the breakup or the coalescence Vcell
process, and the dominating process is determined by the
Here M b is the total mass flow rate of one parcel trajectory and
comparison between the local diameter and equilibrium
diameters. k represents each trajectory in the control volume. Vcell is the
 if d b  d beq control volume. FD and Fvirtual mass are drag and virtual mass
 rel   B (6)
 C if d b  d beq forces on a single bubble. By integrating them with respect to
The relaxation time is restricted by the turbulent microscale the bubble time step tb within the flow time step t f , F c is

given by  k  6 
obtained.
 , where  is the kinematic viscosity of Through the Boussinesq hypothesis, the turbulent stress is
fluid. We have  rel   rel ,  k ;  B is the breakup time scale represented by:
max
2  u u 
2 1  f ui' u'j   f kij  t  i  j 
which is modeled as  B  db 3 and  C is the coalescence
3
3  x j xi 
 
db
time scale which is modeled as  C  . Details
0.2  6  b k 1.3. Free surface damping
There is an increase in turbulent dissipation at the free
can be found in Laux and Johansen [6].
surface in bubble plumes as reported by Soga and Rehmann [9].
1.2. VOF This is the same effect which is observed at walls. Walls and
The VOF method which is a single phase Eulerian-Eulerian internal interfaces cause damping of turbulence. However, most
mixture model, employs an advanced interface tracking scheme implementations of the standard k-ε turbulence model only
known as Youngs’ VOF [8] to track the interface through the consider walls. Internal interfaces such as a liquid-gas
Eulerian mesh. If a cell is found to consist of two or more interphase in a VOF-model is normally ignored. Thus the
phases, an interface must be interpolated through it. The volume standard implementation of the k-ε model over-predict the TKE
fraction mass equations for water (f) and atmosphere (g) are at the free surface when compared to experiments as reported
solved. Note that liquid displacement by bubbles is neglected by Sheng and Irons [10]. Cloete et al. [1] also pointed out that
since coupling to the bubbles is only accounted for in the the standard k-ε model under predicts the surface velocity at
momentum equations. higher flow rate. “This is due to a phenomenon of increased
The transport equation for volume fractions of read: turbulence kinetic energy dissipation in the region of the free
  surface which is not captured by the standard turbulence model.
k  u j  k  0 (7) When turbulent eddies approach and locally lift a free surface,
t x j
there is an increase in the rate of the turbulent energy cascade,
with the constraint  g   f  1 . which ultimately leads to increased TKE dissipation rates.”
This is solved together with a single set of Reynolds averaged Due to this we have to improve the standard
Navier- Stokes equations expressing conservation of momentum implementation of the k-ε model to account for the proximity of
a free surface which is seen as an internal interphase in the VOF
concept. Being aware that the epsilon transport equation is
actually the eddy length scale equation, a model is required to
supply the correct characteristic length to treat the near surface

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 turbulence, and this model should assure the length scale
approaches zero at the free surface. Then a proportional
relationship between the length scale and the physical distance
to the free surface is proposed by Soga & Rehmann (9). The
modeled epsilon  new is designed to override the epsilon value
in computational cells near the surface through the source term
Sdamping in (10).
1/4
 3  C3/4 k 3/2 C3/4 k 3/2
l0   ls , l0   t   ,  new  (9)
   new  ls
 new 
Sdamping  large_number  ( new   ) (10)
where:  =0.4 is the von Karman constant; ls is the physical
Figure 2: Grids of center plane and bottom plane. Red lines
distance to the free surface; l0 is eddy length scale. One should
represent 1.75 m, 3.8 m and 5.88m in height.'
be careful with the choice of “large_number” in (10), as it
should be sufficiently large to enforce  new and at the same
time avoid stability issues. Different scenarios of 10, 100, 1000,
10000 were tested and 1000 satisfied the requirements.
The model framework is thus closed by an enhanced k-
epsilon turbulence model:
k k u u j ui
  u j  t ( i  )
t x j x j xi x j
(11)
  t k 
     
x j   k x j 

    u u j ui 
  u j  C1  t ( i  ) 
t x j k  x j xi x j  Figure 3. Predicted gas density [kg/m3], changing with height,
(12)
     2 for a gas release of 170 Nl/s.
   t    C2  Sdamping
x j    x j  k
source

where    k k and    
k k The source terms in
(12) is implemented through a UDF in FLUENT.

2. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The model is compared against the experimental data of
Engebretsen et al. [2]. They performed a series of experiments
in a rectangular basin with depth of 7 m and a surface area of 6
and 9 m, applying gas rates of 83, 170 and 750 Nl/s. The data
for 170 Nl/s (0.208 kg/s) is used for validation. Model
simulations was performed on a grid with 843528 hexahedral
cells, see Figure 2. The computational domain is 6m by 9m as
the tank, and in vertical direction, it is extended to 10 m to
account for the atmosphere above the water. The cells are
refined to 5cm in the plume and free surface regions.
Some simulation results are illustrated in Figure 3 and Figure
4. The increase of gas density with depth is shown in Figure 3.
Bubble size is seen in Figure 4. The larger bubbles exists in the
outer parts of the plume, where coalescence dominates due to
low turbulence levels; while smaller bubbles tend to be formed
in the center plume, where breakup dominates due to high
turbulence levels.
Figure 4. Predicted bubble size [m] distributions for a gas
release of 170 Nl/s.
The vertical velocity profiles at three heights of 1.75 m, 3.8
m and 5.88m were validated against the experiments as seen in
Figure 5. Here the surface damping effect is small, and only
modelling results including surface damping is shown. It is
observed that the vertical plume velocities predicted by the
model at two lower heights match the experiment quite well,
however there is an underestimation of plume velocities at
5.88m height. In the experiment, the vertical and horizontal
velocities are measured with Höntzsch turbine flow meters [2].
The turbine flow meters works well for mono-directional flows.

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 3
exp 1.75m
exp 3.8m
2.5 exp 5.88m
model 1.75m
model 3.8m
model 5.88m
vertical velocity [m/s]

1.5

0.5

0
0 0.5 1 1.5 2
radial distance [m] Figure 7: Comparison of contours of TKE [m2/s2]. Left is the
Figure 5: Comparison of predicted vertical velocities and standard k-epsilon model and the right is with damping effects.
experiments at 1.75 m, 3.8 m and 5.88m in height for a gas
release of 170 Nl/s.

However, the flow starts to bend when approaching the surface,

which will give an underestimation of the measurement of flow
velocities. Thus the inconsistency between model and
experiments at the upper level should not be attributed to model
shortcomings.
Figure 6-Figure 8 compare the standard k-ε implementation
and the k-ε implementation with surface damping correction.
The surface damping model will produce higher dissipation
(Figure 8) that will dampen the turbulent kinetic energy (Figure
7), and produce a faster surface flow (Figure 6). Figure 9 gives
a quantitative comparison of the outwelling surface flow Figure 8: Comparison of contours of dissipation [m2/s3]. Left is
between model and experiments. We see that the damping the standard k-epsilon model and the right is with damping
module gives 75% improvement compared to the standard effects.
model.
Figure 10 compares the gas concentrations leaking into the 7
atmosphere. Most gas reach the surface in the center boil 6.8
region, also it is shifted away by the surface current. The
6.6
damping module gives the higher gas concentration.
6.4

6.2 exp
Height [m]

standard
6 damping

5.8

5.6

5.4

5.2

5
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 1.4 1.6
velocity magnitude [m/s]

Figure 9: Comparison between experimental and modeled

Figure 6: Comparison of contours of velocity magnitude [m/s].
Left is the standard k-epsilon model and the right is with
damping effects.
velocity magnitudes near the top surface, 1.75 m from the
plume center. Flows are predominantly in the radial direction.
Square symbols represent experimental data. Simulation results
from the standard k-epsilon model ("standard") is marked with
dashed lines, while simulation results from the enhanced
turbulence model that account for damping effects ("damping")
is given by solid lines.

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Figure 10: Comparison of predicted contours of bubble mass
concentrations [kg/m3] leaking into atmosphere. Above is with
the standard k-epsilon model, while below is with the enhanced
turbulence model that account for damping effects.
3. CONCLUSIONS
A modelling concept for bubble plumes resulting from a
subsea gas release has been presented. This includes en
enhanced implementation of the k-ε model which accounts for
turbulence damping at the ocean surface. The free surface
damping model provides more reasonable eddy length scales in
vicinity of free surface and thus improve the prediction of the
surface velocities of the bubble plumes. When compared to
experiments there is good consistency of the results. The
modelling concept should thus be applicable to risk assessment
of potential incidents with subsea gas release.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The authors would like to thank the funding from SURE
project (Advanced Modeling Tool for Subsea Gas Release) in
SINTEF for this research.
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stats
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