Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Numerical simulation of filling process of natural gas onboard vehicle cylinder

  • Technical Paper
  • Published:
Journal of the Brazilian Society of Mechanical Sciences and Engineering Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

The accurate modeling of the filling compressed natural gas fueled vehicle storage cylinders is a complex process and should be studied deeply. The minimum filling time has positive impact on commercialization of natural gas vehicles. In other hand, very fast filling may be resulted to unexpected temperature rise and violating the safety standards. This study investigates flow and heat transfer in natural gas vehicle’s onboard cylinder during filling. The cylinder is assumed to be a type III onboard storage cylinder. An axisymmetric computational model for unsteady, compressible turbulent flow has been built. A computational fluid dynamics has been developed for predicting the temperature and pressure change during the fill based on using commercial software Fluent. The natural gas (NG) as working fluid is treated as a real gas. The Redlich–Kwong equation of state has been employed to compute the thermodynamic properties of NG. The computation results have been compared with previous measured values and show good agreement. The results show that the temperature rise for NG is about 35 K. The most of heat dissipation from the in-cylinder gas is stored in the cylinder wall during the fill and the heat lost to the ambient is small.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8
Fig. 9
Fig. 10
Fig. 11
Fig. 12
Fig. 13

Similar content being viewed by others

Abbreviations

d :

Inlet tube diameter, 5 mm

c p :

Constant pressure specific heats, kJ/(kg K)

c v :

Constant volume specific heats, kJ/(kg K)

C 1ε :

Constant of the k-ε model, defined by Eq. (1)

C 2ε :

Constant of the k-ε model, defined by Eq. (1)

C μ :

Constant of the k-ε model, defined by Eq. (1)

C 1 :

Constant for ideal gas specific heat curve fit for methane, 1,982.87

C 2 :

Constant for ideal gas specific heat curve fit for methane, −2.0622

C 3 :

Constant for ideal gas specific heat curve fit for methane, 12.727e−3

C 4 :

Constant for ideal gas specific heat curve fit for methane, −11.782e−6

C 5 :

Constant for ideal gas specific heat curve fit for methane, 3.609e−9

c :

Speed of sound in methane, m/s

E :

Empirical constant, 9.793

g :

Gravitational acceleration, m/s2

h :

Convective heat transfer coefficient, W/(m2 K)

I :

Total enthalpy, J

i :

Specific enthalpy, kJ/kg

K :

Thermal conductivity, W/(m K)

\( \dot{m} \) :

Mass flow rate, kg/s

M :

Molecular weight, kg/kmol

Ma :

Mach number, dimensionless

P :

Pressure, bar or Pa

p c :

Methane critical pressure, bar or Pa

\( \dot{q} \) :

Heat transfer rate between in-cylinder gas and inner wall, kW/m2

S :

Entropy, kJ/K

R :

Universal gas constant, J/(mol K)

r :

Radius, m

T :

Temperature, K or °C

T c :

Methane critical temperature, K or °C

T r :

Reduced temperature, dimensionless

t :

Time, s

U :

Specific internal energy, kJ/kg

u :

Velocity, m/s

u + :

Dimensionless velocity in the law of the wall, dimensionless

v :

Specific volume, m3/kg

w :

Acentric factor, 0.011 for methane

y + :

Dimensionless wall coordinate in law of the wall, dimensionless

μ :

Viscosity, Pa s

ρ :

Density, kg/m3

δ :

Kronecker delta

σ k :

Constant of k-ε model, 1.0

σ ε :

Constant of k-ε model, 1.3

σ T,L :

Laminar or molecular Prandtl number

σ T,t :

Turbulent Prandtl number, 0.85 at the wall

τ ij :

Stress tensor, Pa

κ :

Von Karman constant, 0.4187

In:

Inlet condition

o:

Outer

i:

Inner

w:

Refer to cylinder wall properties

g:

Refer to in-cylinder gas

_ :

Average

~:

Favre average

O:

Related to ideal gas or reference state

′:

Turbulent fluctuating component

References

  1. Annamalai K, Puri IK (2010, 2002) Advanced thermodynamics engineering, chap 7. CRC Press, London

  2. Chan Kim S, Hoon Lee S, Bong Yoon K (2010) Thermal characteristics during hydrogen fuelling process of type IV cylinder. Int J Hydrogen Energy 35:6830–6835

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Cheremisinoff NP (1984) Fluid flow pocket handbook. Gulf Publishing Co., Houston

    Google Scholar 

  4. Dicken CJB (2007) Temperature distribution within a compressed gas cylinder during fast filling. Advanced materials research (1662-8985)

  5. Dicken CJB, Merida W (2008) Modeling the transient temperature distribution within a hydrogen cylinder during refuelling, numerical heat transfer. Part A 53:1–24

    Google Scholar 

  6. Dicken CJB, Merida W (2007) Measured effects of filling time and initial mass on the temperature distribution within a hydrogen cylinder during refueling. J Power Sourc 165:324–336

    Google Scholar 

  7. Eckert ERG, Drake RM (1972) Analysis of heat and mass transfer. McGraw-Hill Co., New York

  8. Farzaneh-Gord M, Deymi-Dashtebayaz M, Rahbari HR, Niazmand H (2012) Effects of storage types and conditions on compressed hydrogen fuelling stations performance. Int J Hydrogen Energy (in press)

  9. Farzaneh-Gord M, Hashemi SH, Farzaneh-Kord A (2008) Thermodynamics analysis of cascade reservoirs filling process of natural gas vehicle cylinders. World Appl Sci J 5(2):143–149

    Google Scholar 

  10. Farzaneh-Gord M (2008b) Compressed natural gas Single reservoir filling process. In: Gas international engineering and management, vol 48, issue 6. July/August, pp 16–18

  11. Farzaneh-Gord M, Deymi Dasht-bayaz M, Rahbari HR (2011) Studying effects of storage types on performance of CNG filling stations. J Natural Gas Sci Eng 3334–340

  12. Farzaneh-Gord M, Eftekhari H, Hashemi S, Magrebi M, Dorafshan M (2007) The effect of initial conditions on filling process of CNG cylinders. In: The second International conference on modelling, simulation, and applied optimization, Abu Dhabi, UAE, March 24–27

  13. Heitsch M, Baraldi D, Moretto P (2011) Numerical investigations on the fast filling of hydrogen tanks. Int J Hydrogen Energy 36:2606–2612

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Jayatilleke C (1969) The Influence of Prandtl number and surface roughness on the resistance of the laminar sublayer to momentum and heat transfer. Prog Heat Mass Transf 1:193–321

    Google Scholar 

  15. Kountz K, Liss W, Blazek C (1998a) A new natural gas dispenser control system. In: Paper at 1998 International Gas Research Conference, San Diego, November 3

  16. Kountz K, Liss W, Blazek C (1998b) Automated process and system for dispensing compressed natural gas. U.S. Patent 5,810,058, Sept. 22

  17. Kountz K, Liss W, Blazek C (1998c) Method and apparatus for dispensing compressed natural gas. U. S. Patent 5,752,552, May 19

  18. Kountz K (1994) Modeling the fast fill process in natural gas vehicle storage cylinders. American Chemical Society Paper at 207th National ACS Meeting, March

  19. Kountz KJ, Blazek CF (1997) NGV fuelling station and dispenser control systems. Report GRI-97/0398, Gas Research Institute, Chicago, Illinois, November

  20. Liss WE, Richards M (2002) Development of a natural gas to hydrogen fueling station. In: Topical Report for U.S. DOE, GTI-02/0193, September

  21. Liss WE, Richards ME, Kountz K, Kriha K (2003) Modeling and testing of fast-fill control algorithms for hydrogen fuelling. National Hydrogen Association Meeting, March

  22. Liu YL, Zhao YZ, Zhao L, Li X, Chen HG, Zhang LF (2010) Experimental studies on temperature rise within a hydrogen cylinder during refuelling. Int J Hydrogen Energy 35:2627–2632

    Article  Google Scholar 

  23. Li Q, Zhou J, Chang Q, Xing W (2012) Effects of geometry and inconstant mass flow rate on temperatures within a pressurized hydrogen cylinder during refueling. Int J Hydrogen Energy 37:6043–6052

    Article  Google Scholar 

  24. Newhouse NL, Liss WE (1999) Fast filling of NGV fuel containers, SAE paper. 01-3739

  25. Ouellette P, Hill PG (2000) Turbulent transient gas injections. J Fluids Eng 122:743–753

    Article  Google Scholar 

  26. Shipley E (2002) Study of natural gas vehicles (NGV) during the fast fills process. Thesis for Master of Science, College of Engineering and Mineral Resources at West Virginia University

  27. Thomas G, Goulding J, Munteam C (2002) Measurement, approval and verification of CNG dispensers. In: NWML KT11 Report

  28. Versteeg HK, Malalasekera W (1955) An introduction to computational fluid dynamics the finite volume method. Longman Scientific & Technical, Harlow

  29. Yang JC (2009) A thermodynamic analysis of refuelling of a hydrogen tank. Int J Hydrogen Energy 34:6712–6721

    Article  Google Scholar 

  30. Zhao L, Liu Y, Yang J, Zhao Y, Zheng J, Bie H, Liu X (2010) Numerical simulation of temperature rise within hydrogen vehicle cylinder during refueling. Int J Hydrogen Energy 35:8092–8100

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Mechanical Engineering Department, Shahrood University of Technology, 316, Shahrood, Iran

    Navid NoorAliPour Nahavandi & Mahmood Farzaneh-Gord

Authors
  1. Navid NoorAliPour Nahavandi
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Mahmood Farzaneh-Gord
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Navid NoorAliPour Nahavandi.

Additional information

Technical Editor: Horacio Vielmo.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

NoorAliPour Nahavandi, N., Farzaneh-Gord, M. Numerical simulation of filling process of natural gas onboard vehicle cylinder. J Braz. Soc. Mech. Sci. Eng. 35, 247–256 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40430-013-0020-3

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40430-013-0020-3

Keywords

Search

Navigation