ABSTRACT
The United States Natural Gas Industry requirements for high accuracy analysis of natural gas pointed out a need for interlaboratory comparison of compositional analysis. Scott Specialty Gases, in response to this need, has developed a Cross Reference Service to correlate analytical results between laboratories. The majority of the Natural Gas Industry uses gas chromatography as a fast, efficient and reliable analytical technique. Estimates of United States gas production in 1984 are approximately 18 quadrillion BTU or 83 billion dollars. The BTU Cross Reference Service cylinders are manufactured from a master cylinder containing at least 8–9 natural gas components in a Methane balance gas. This mixture is then transferred to 25 or more smaller cylinders. In the process of manufacturing, the major problems appear to be the same as has been met in the field: transferring of natural gas mixtures without condensation, separation of heavy hydrocarbons, and pressure and temperature changes which occur inside of the sample system.
