The Mexican Energy Regulatory Commission, Comisión Reguladora de Energía (CRE), has recently approved the use of new short-term service agreements. The need for the agreements within the national gas pipeline system (SNG) was triggered by the development of pipeline infrastructure and is described in the national infrastructure plan developed by the Energy Ministry, Secretaría de Energía (SENER). The Mexican National Center for Natural Gas Control, CENAGAS, required a mechanism to include the new agreements in pipeline simulations. This paper explains the pipeline simulation techniques being implemented to model the new agreements.
The steady-state and transient simulation offers justification for the construction of new facilities; and establishes the operating requirements of new interconnections and the installation or reconfiguration of compressor stations. The paper also discusses how CENAGAS incorporates the pipeline simulation techniques for short-term service agreements into the existing capacity determination processes. The paper also verifies the parameters and assumptions that CENAGAS has determined are important for pipeline simulation of the new short-term service agreements.
National Gas Pipeline System (SNG): The Transport and Storage Unit (UTA) of CENAGAS is responsible for the operation and maintenance of approximately 87 pipelines of 4" to 48" inches diameter, with a length of 5348 miles (8610 kilometers) and a capacity of more than 5 BCFD, of pipeline extending from the Sonora, Nuevo León and Tamaulipas border to the Paso/Texas border with connections to other natural gas pipelines in the U.S.
National infrastructure Plan: This document establishes that in the period 2017-2031 a decrease in national natural gas production is observed, which leads to an increase in the importation of natural gas, Imports into 2031 could reach 4.6 BCFD, in a scenario in that all imports would be transported by pipelines (without considering the imports of LNG), as a result of the development of the new gas pipeline infrastructure. This volume would represent 48% of the national gas supply.
