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Hydrogen blending into offshore natural gas pipelines is increasingly regarded as a transitional decarbonization pathway; however, its implications for deep-water subsea flow assurance remain insufficiently understood. This study presents a field-validated assessment of hydrogen–natural gas co-transport in a deep-water subsea pipeline, integrating hydraulic, thermal, corrosion, erosion, hydrate, vapor-fraction, and heat-transfer analyses within a unified modeling framework. The Atoll gas field (Eastern Mediterranean, approximately 920 m water depth) is selected as a representative case study. A 20-inch subsea production and export pipeline system is simulated using Aspen HYSYS® Version 14 and validated against High Integrity Pipeline Protection System (HIPPS) field data, with deviations below 3 %. Hydrogen blending levels ranging from 0 to 50 vol% are investigated. The results indicate that hydrogen enrichment reduces overall pressure losses and enhances vapor-phase stability due to lower mixture density, while increasing flow velocity and erosion-related parameters within acceptable operational limits. Accelerated cooling associated with hydrogen’s higher thermal conductivity increases operational hydrate risk, governed primarily by thermo-hydraulic effects rather than hydrate thermodynamics. A 50 % hydrogen blend is adopted as a conservative upper-bound scenario to examine limiting flow assurance behavior. Overall, the findings provide practical insights for offshore hydrogen blending feasibility and preliminary flow assurance screening.
Soliman et al. (Mon,) studied this question.