Ball Valve Gas Evacuation Control for Leak Containment
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Solution Overview
Problem
During maintenance of gas pipelines, fluid leaks through valve seals can pose safety risks due to unintentional combustion and inhalation hazards, and venting the gas to the atmosphere is harmful to the environment.
Innovation Solution
A valve evacuation system that compresses and pumps leaked gas back into the high-pressure region, preventing it from entering the low-pressure maintenance area, thereby reducing safety risks and environmental impact.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If the valve is closed to prevent fluid flow during maintenance, then safety is improved by isolating the high-pressure region, but fluid can leak through valve seals creating combustion and inhalation hazards in the low-pressure region
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a pump as an intermediary device between the valve and the low-pressure region. The pump actively removes leaked fluid from the low-pressure region, serving as a mediator that prevents hazardous accumulation while maintaining the valve's closed position for safety isolation.
Solution Approach 2:
The system employs sensors to detect fluid leakage and pressure conditions, providing feedback to the control system. This feedback mechanism enables real-time monitoring and automatic activation of the pump when leakage is detected, ensuring continuous safety without requiring manual intervention.
2Object-affected harmful factors
If gas is vented to the atmosphere to prevent accumulation in the low-pressure region, then safety hazards are reduced, but environmental harm is caused
Solution Approach 1:
The patent converts the harmful leaked gas into a beneficial resource by routing it through the pump system back to the high-pressure region or to authorized disposal. This transforms the waste product (leaked gas causing environmental harm) into a controlled flow that can be recovered or properly managed, eliminating both safety hazards and environmental damage simultaneously.
3Object-affected harmful factors
If a pump system is added to evacuate and compress leaked gas, then safety and environmental impact are improved, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The pump system is designed to perform multiple functions: it evacuates leaked fluid, compresses the gas, transports it back to the high-pressure region, and can interface with disposal systems. This multi-functionality reduces the need for separate dedicated systems for each task, thereby limiting the increase in overall device complexity while achieving comprehensive safety and environmental protection.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The system effectively prevents gas leaks from reaching the low-pressure region, minimizing the risk of combustion and inhalation hazards while avoiding atmospheric venting.
Implementation Method 1
the valve evacuation system to compress the fluid from the first location and pump the compressed fluid to the second location
Implementation Method 2
the valve evacuation system to compress the fluid from the first location and pump the compressed fluid to the second location
Data Source
AI summary
An apparatus to evacuate fluid is disclosed herein. The example apparatus includes a pipe to transport flammable gas, the pipe including a first valve fluidly coupled to a first region of the pipe and a second valve fluidly coupled to a second region of the pipe, a ball valve implemented along the pipe between the first region and the second region, and a valve evacuation system to compress the flammable gas from the ball valve and pump the compressed flammable gas to the first region via the first valve when the ball valve is in the closed position such that the flammable gas from the ball valve is not vented to atmosphere.