Ionic liquids as dual functional inhibitors for natural gas hydrates (NGH)

Abstract

The thermodynamic inhibition (TI) and kinetic inhibition (KI) effect of pyrrolidinium based Ionic liquids (ILs) 1-Methyl-1-Propyl-pyrrolidinium Chloride [PM-Py][Cl] and 1-Methyl-1-Propyl-pyrrolidinium Triflate [PM-Py][Triflate] have been tested with and without the addition of synergents/additives such as polyethylene oxide (PEO) and Caprolactum (Cap) on the methane rich mixture (Methane C1:85.24 %, Ethane C2:10.03 %, Carbon dioxide CO2:2.49%, Nitrogen N2:2.22 and n-hexane C6+: 0.02 %) using the rocking cell assembly at different concentrations (1-5wt%) and pressure range of 40-120 bars. The experimental results, show that the selected ILs act as thermodynamic and kinetic inhibitors both simultaneously. The addition of synergent/additives in equal ratio with ILs helps to improve their kinetic and thermodynamic inhibition performance significantly.