TABLE OF CONTENTS Hydrocarbon condensate recovered from natural gas may be shipped without further processing but is stabilized often for blending into the crude oil stream and thereby sold as crude oil. In the case of raw condensate, there are no particular specifications for the product other than the process requirements. The process of increasing the amount of intermediates (C 3 to C 5) and heavy (C + 6) components in the condensate is called "condensate stabilization." This process is performed primarily in order to reduce the vapor pressure of the condensate liquids so that a vapor phase is not produced upon flashing the liquid to atmospheric storage tanks. In other word, the scope of this process is to separate the very light hydrocarbon gases, methane and ethane in particular, from the heavier hydrocarbon components (C + 3). Stabilized liquid, however, generally has a vapor pressure specification, as the product will be injected into a pipeline or transport pressure vessel, which has definite pressure limitations. Condensates may contain a relatively high percentage of intermediate components and can be separated easily from entrained water due to its lower viscosity and greater density difference with water. Thus, some sort of condensate stabilization should be considered for each gas well production facility. The purpose of this chapter is to describe the basic processes used to condensate stabilization and associated equipment design procedure.
Stabilization of condensate streams can be accomplished through either flash vaporization or fractionation.
