Simulation analysis of thermal influential factors on crude oil temperature when double pipelines are laid in one ditch

•Thermal influential factors affecting crude oil temperature in double pipelines system have been analyzed in detail.•Insulating layer and changes of crude oil physical characteristic are considered to correspond with practice.•Ambient temperature is a key parameter to determine pipeline interval.

Crude oil pipeline laid with products pipeline in the same ditch is a new technology to save investment and protect environment. In order to provide reference to construction and operation optimization, the majority of this paper investigates the thermal influential factors affecting the crude oil temperature in double pipelines system using the computational fluid dynamics methodology. A two-dimensional rectangular region including the two pipelines is selected as computational domain in this investigation. Heat transfer models are proposed to obtain the temperature field distribution and the crude oil temperature drop. The impacts of pipeline interval, crude oil temperature at the outlet of heating station, diameter of crude oil pipeline and atmosphere temperature have been reasonably captured and analyzed in details.