With fewer moving parts and no greenhouse gas emissions, Kimray Inc.'s new electric glycol pump appears to have a potentially huge market in the gas processing industry. The Oklahoma City-based company's pump, which is now in what is referred to as a "soft release" is being called the first of its kind.

Karl Kovacich is vice president of operations for Control Equipment, the Odessa company that has distributed Kimray products in West Texas and southeast New Mexico for 62 years. He explained that, instead of the traditional piston assembly, the new pump uses pistons to operate a diaphragm, wherein the diaphragm does the moving of the glycol.

"This has a small piston rod that, instead of moving a piston on the end, it moves a diaphragm. As the diaphragm flexes, it pumps the fluid," he said.

According to Kimray, "The pump is the first of its kind to use a patented hydraulically balanced diaphragm to pump particles in suspension... The electric glycol pump is a positive displacement diaphragm pump which keeps the process fluid separate from the internal mechanisms."

The new pump's capacity ranges from 1.5 to 8.3 gpm, pressures from 0 to 1,500 psi and temperatures up to 250 degrees F, depending on how the pump is configured at installation. Kovacich stated Kimray is developing pumps to handle both larger and smaller flow rates.

Two years of field testing, after a year of development time, have shown the pumps to be much more reliable and, when repairs are needed, more easily repaired than most piston glycol pumps.

Glycol pumps -- some of which are electric and some of which are gas-powered -- are used to remove water from natural gas streams. For larger wells this can be done at the wellhead, but most commonly it is done at processing plants that take gas from the gathering system, remove water, propane and other NGLs before sending it into pipelines.

With new EPA regulations taking effect that require monitoring of greenhouse gas emissions at wellheads and at processing facilities, Kimray's pump has drawn interest because it is electric-powered.

Control Equipment participated in the pump's test phase by finding clients who were willing to install them in the field. Kovacich said everyone who tested a pump was interested in buying some. Control Equipment has four of the pumps on order, and he expects delivery almost any day.

Those who did the field tests told Kovacich they liked the pumps' ease of maintenance when such was needed, but mainly the fact that they rarely needed maintenance. The zero-emissions factor was another plus.

Paul Wiseman can be reached at fittoprint@sbcglobal.net.