Experimental study of supercritical CO2 leakage behavior from pressurized vessels

The accidental leakage is one of the main risks in supercritical CO2 transportation and storage system. A new experimental facility was built to study the leakage behavior of supercritical CO2 flow. The leakage flow and jet flow behaviors of supercritical CO2 from pressurized vessels were experimentally investigated. The upstream temperature was examined ranging from 34.9 to 100.5 °C. The effects of upstream pressure were tested ranging from 8.1 to 11.0 MPa. The effects of nozzle geometry structure were tested by using six nozzles with length-diameter ratio (L/D) ranging from 1 to 15. The supercritical CO2 leakage mass flow rate decreases with the increase of upstream temperature and L/D, and increases with the increase of upstream pressure. An empirical correlation with geometric and thermal parameters is developed based on a large amount of experimental data. The experimental data of leakage flow and empirical correlation could be used for safety assessment and theoretical model validation.