OCR Text |
Show is framed against the southwestern sky at El Paso Natural's Lindrith Compressor Station in the productive San Juan Basin of northern New Mexico. TURBINE STATIONS, in common with AN INDIAN couple insure efficient operation. other El Paso facilities, are carefully overhauled to - many Navajos in its operations. In this picare overhauling reciprocating compressor engines. ture, Navajo employees EL PASO NATURAL employs Jatiiraliasseldomj Gas transmission companies exist to transport natural gas from the fields where it is produced to the cities, towns, and industries where it is consumed. ' Natural gas, to reach the consumers, travels through steel pipelines buried underground. What keeps it moving through these lines? When it leaves the. well, natural gas occasionally is under pressure sufficient for initial processing and transmission. However, most of the gas that El Paso Natural Gas Company draws upon is found at relatively low pressures. This means that this gas must be compressed before itisprocessed furtherThe Company usually compresses gas to 525 pounds per square inch prior to treating, and to 830 pounds for transmission. As the gas moves through the pipelines, the friction between theeoLth&pirjelmesi drop. It is necessary, therefore, to vals along the mainline. ess thegas at inter- ,()mprerstationa Jirebuili,at,mteryalsfroni , miles apart on the mainlines. In the pipeline system of El Paso Natural, these stations are of two kinds: reciprocating stations and turbine stations. Reciprocating stations operate much as a tire pump forces the air within its cylindeHnto3smallerspaceasthe, handle is pushed down7 in these compressor stations, reciprocating"" engines push the pistons that compress the gas. During the past 10 years, El Paso Natural has built turbine compressor stations along its mainline system. The gas turbine engine powers a different kind of compressor a centrifugal compressor. In place of a piston, the centrifugal compressor has a bladed wheel that whirls at high speed, literally throwing each bladeful of gas into a tunnel-lik- e enclosure. . The increase in the number of compressor stations along the Company system is good index of the growth in use of natural gas in the western states. In 1940, 1 Paso Natural had seven compressor stations with an installed capacity of 24,600 horsepower. At the end sf 19G1, the Company had 112 tsmpressor stations, with an installed horsepower capacity --of 1,130,925. i i i ...... j. ' . 10 Special "Supplement toy El Paso Natural Gas Company, Adv.) ifwciaoiciiiici CiiJrfnrrtu(CT1 ia3iaagejiilMt 11 Special Supplement by El Paso 'Natural Gas Company. (Adv.) |