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Article history: Oilwater two-phase ow widely exists in the process of petroleum industry. The liquid holdup mea-
Received 30 November 2014 surement in horizontal pipeline is very important and difcult. In this work, a Conductance and Capa-
Received in revised form citance Combination Sensor (CCCS) system with four conductance rings and two concave capacitance
4 May 2015
plates is designed and validated for its measurement performance of in situ water holdup through dy-
Accepted 22 June 2015
Available online 24 June 2015
namic experiments. A set of fast electronic switches controls the conductance rings and the capacitance
plates alternatively set up each own sensing eld in the same sensing volume. This conguration ensures
Keywords: the water holdup estimation in the range from 0% to 100% regardless of ow direction. A set of quick
Conductance sensor closing valves was used to acquire the in situ holdup for the on-line calibration of the CCCS system. The
Capacitance sensor
theoretical correlations of conductance sensor and capacitance sensor were established to make the real-
Water holdup measurement
time measurement convenient. A real-time measurement method by CCCS system is provided based on
Oilwater two-phase ow
Quick closing valve the fusion of the conductance and the capacitance measurement without ow pattern recognition. This
Sensor fusion method delivers an average error of 1.06% for the CCCS system measuring the water holdup of oilwater
two-phase ow, with a standard deviation of 0.038 and a relative error less than 7 5%.
& 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.owmeasinst.2015.06.026
0955-5986/& 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
H. Wu et al. / Flow Measurement and Instrumentation 46 (2015) 218229 219
designed a conductance probe for measuring the liquid fraction in realize the fast and accurate acquisition of the conductance and
gasliquid two-phase ows and evaluated its performance. The the capacitance data. Theoretical correlations of the conductance
device consisting of two pairs of electrodes (two ring electrodes sensor and the capacitance sensor have been improved to make
and two plate electrodes) was placed on the internal wall of a the real-time measurement convenient. The CCCS system can
cylindrical duct and ushed to the pipe surface [14]. Then, Devia measure the full range of in situ water holdup without ow pat-
and Fossa designed and optimized an impedance probe for void tern recognition. The installation method and the measurement
fraction measurement for different gasliquid ow patterns [15]. results are not inuenced by the ow direction based on its
Lucas and Mishra proposed a local four-sensor probe to measure symmetrical structure. The non-intrusive water holdup measure-
the swirl inuence for bubble ow in vertical pipe, and analyzed ment method can reduce pressure loss and processing difculty.
the impedance and time sequence of electronic measurement Therefore, the CCCS system has application prospect in petroleum
system [16]. Xu et al. measured the water hold-up of stratied oil industry.
water ow by a conductance array consisting of 24 needle-like
electrodes that mounted on 12 supporting arms arising from the
central shaft [17]. Zhai et al. numerically designed and optimized 2. Sensor structure
the geometry of a ring conductance probe for measuring the
conductance of oilwater mixtures in horizontal pipes [18]. Dang The test section of CCCS is shown in Fig. 1, which consists of
et al. used the conductance sensor to measure the ow rate of oil four stainless alloy ring-electrodes (conductance sensor) and a
gaswater three-phase ow [19]. pair of copper plates (capacitance sensor). All the electrodes are
For the capacitance method, the non-continuous phase should placed on a Plexiglas pipe of 50 mm inner diameter. The con-
have a different relative permittivity compared with the con- ductance rings and the capacitance plates of the CCCS set up each
tinuous phase [20]. Sami et al. found that a concave-plate capa- own sensing eld in the same sensing volume alternatively. The
citance sensor has a higher sensitivity for void fraction measure- switch time is short enough to make sure the uid condition re-
ment in two-phase ow [21]. Huang et al. discussed the con- mains almost the same in the sensing volume during the switches
ductivity effects on capacitance measurements, and concluded between conductance and capacitance. This structure is non-in-
that the conductance effects can be reduced by using semi- trusive and can deal with the incoming ow at either direction.
conductor switches [22]. Xie et al. used nite element model to
prove that the pipe wall is an important factor to the sensitivity 2.1. Conductance sensor
distribution of the concave capacitance sensor [23]. Jaworek and
Krupa increased the excitation frequency up to 80 MHz to solve The four probes conductance sensor is designed to measure the
the capacitance measurement problem when the continuous water holdup in water continuous oilwater two-phase ow. The
phase is conductive [24]. Strazza and Demoria obtained the re- detail of conductance sensor is shown in Fig. 2(a). The ring elec-
lationship between the accurate phase fraction and the axis length
trodes are embedded in the inner wall of a Plexiglas pipe, where
of the capacitance plate for the core-annular oilwater two-phase
E1 and E2 are the exciting electrodes; S1 and S2 are the measuring
ow [25]. Ye and Peng suggested an optimal structure of helical
electrodes. In a pipe of 50 mm inner diameter, the distance be-
capacitance sensor by simulation and experiments for gasliquid
tween E1 and E2 is 200 mm, the distance between S1 and S2 is
two-phase ow in small diameter tubes [26,27]. Kerpel used the
60 mm, the distance between E1 and S1, E2 and S2 is 70 mm, the
capacitance sensors to evaluate the gaswater two-phase ow
width of E1 and E2 is 5 mm, and the width of S1 and S2 is 3 mm.
behaviors in up and downstream of a sharp return bend [28]. Dos
This conguration has been numerically optimized and experi-
Reis et al. compared the advantages and disadvantages of different
mentally tested in previous work [30].
capacitance sensors, such as helical electrodes sensor, concave
The measured electrical impedance across an electrode pair
electrodes sensor and double ring sensor [29].
immersed in a conducting liquid is resistive when the frequency of
However, in the oilwater two-phase ow, phase inversion
the alternating current (AC) exciting signal is high enough (for tap
happens when water holdup ranges from 0% to 100%. When water
water, 10100 kHz) [14]. In this system, the conductance electro-
holdup is large, water is continuous phase, and oil disperses in the
des E1 and E2 are connected to a constant electric current signal
water, and vice versa. Capacitance method can deal with full range
source that generates a 20 kHz square wave of 2 mA peak-to-peak
holdup measurement with careful conguration of the sensing
amplitude (Fig. 2(b)). The electric potential drop increases with the
circuit, but the sensitivity is relatively low for the water con-
overall resistance between E1 and E2 under the constant exciting
tinuous ow, especially for high water holdup situation. Con-
current. Therefore, the voltage collected between S1 and S2
ductance method can deal with the high water holdup situation
(Sensor A) is directly related to the water holdup.
with relatively high sensitivity, but it is incapable to deal with the
low water holdup situation. Since capacitance sensor and con-
ductance sensor are sensitive to phase inversion condition, it is 2.2. Concave capacitance sensor
necessary to design an electrical method to realize water holdup
measurement for full range of oilwater two-phase ow with high A pair of capacitance electrode is designed to measure water
sensitivity. Thus a new Conductance and Capacitance Combination
Sensor (CCCS) system is presented based on the different sensi-
tivity ranges of capacitance and conductance method. It takes the
advantages of the conductance sensor and capacitance sensor in
different ow conditions, and measures the water holdup from 0%
to 100% with high sensitivity. The measurement complementary
information deals with phase inversion, and redundant informa-
tion and data fusion improve the accuracy of water holdup
measurement.
The congurations of both the conductance sensor and the
capacitance sensor of the CCCS system have been optimized. The
measurement system and control software were designed to Fig. 1. Structure of Conductance and Capacitance Combination Sensor (CCCS).
220 H. Wu et al. / Flow Measurement and Instrumentation 46 (2015) 218229
3. Theoretical correlations
Fig. 2. The conductance sensor conguration and the exciting current wave form. For horizontal oilwater two-phase ow, different ow rates
(a) Conductance probe conguration and (b) the exciting current. cause different ow patterns, which may lead to different theo-
retical correlations for phase fraction estimation. There are six
holdup in oil continuous oilwater two-phase ow. Two copper horizontal ow patterns, i.e. stratied ow (ST), stratied ow
plates were oppositely placed on the outer wall of the Plexiglas with mixing at the interfaces (ST&MI), dispersion of oil in water
pipe to form the sensing volume. and water (O/W&W), dispersion of water in oil and oil in water
When the continuous phase has very low conductivity, the (W/O &O/W), oil in water emulsion (O/W), water in oil emulsion
measured capacitance is linearly correlated with the water holdup. (W/O) [2]. Different ow patterns describe the different ow
However, in the actual oil production or transportation process, states. The observation and classication of the ow pattern are
the conductivity of the water is high, bringing troubles to the es- conducive to analyze the oil continuous state and water con-
timation of the phase fraction through the capacitance measure- tinuous state and the measurement error. Thus, theoretical cor-
ment. An effective way to decrease the inuence of water con- relations are appropriate to calculate measurement results.
ductivity is to increase the axial length L of the electrodes [25].
Considering the relationship between axial length and sensitivity, 3.1. Conductance measurement correlation
the distance between the conductance rings S1 and S2 (where the
capacitance sensor locates), and the shield effect of the capaci- The conductivity of the tap water is about 0.040.05 S/m, while
tance electrodes, L is selected as 30 mm in the system. The shape that of oil is close to zero. When the electric current ows into the
of electrodes is concavely congured with an opening angle sensing volume, the measured voltage between S1 and S2 is pro-
90 so that it is more sensitive than other electrode structures portional to the holdup of water in the volume between these two
[31]. The capacitance electrodes structure is shown in Fig. 3(a). electrodes.
To deal with the conductive water continuous ow situations, In oilwater two-phase ow, the density of oil is smaller than
Jaworek suggested that raising the frequency of exciting signal to water. The oil will ow on the top of the horizontal pipe when the
80 MHz could effectively eliminate water conductivity inuence ow rate is low. For the ST ow pattern, in order to eliminate the
inuence of water conductivity change and normalize the mea-
surement results, a dimensionless voltage V describing the relative
voltage difference is introduced based on the analytical results
[33]
Vw
V=
Vm (1)
3V
Ht =
2+V (3)
3.2. Capacitance measurement correlation Fig. 4. Equivalent model and circuit for concave capacitance. (a) Cross section of
the full pipe with water and (b) equivalent circuit.
peak-to-peak current signal of 20 kHz frequency. The corrosion instrumentation ampliers to produce the 20 V peak-to-peak
and deposition caused by electrolytic effects of the conductance voltage of 1 MHz frequency. The measured capacitance Cm is an
electrodes can be minimized by the connection with a high input extremely small value which consists of the capacitance of pipe
impedance electrical circuit with the alternating current. The wall and oilwater two-phase uid. To obtain accurate Cm, the
conductance circuit structure is shown in Fig. 6. exciting signal source Vi is connected with one of the capacitance
The impedance matching is realized in a circuit in the signal- electrodes, and the other capacitance electrode is connected to the
conditioning unit as shown in Fig. 7. A capacitance of 220 nF and a C/V (capacitance to electric voltage) transfer circuit and the signal
resistance of 2.2 M are connected to the core cable to receive the processing circuit. The output voltage by the C/V transfer circuit Vo
effective AC signal. A 30 resistance is connected to the screen can be calculated by the following equation:
cable to avoid the inuence of the stray capacitance between the
jVi R f
cable and the screen. Vo = Cm
For the capacitance measurement, Huang designed a new ca- 1 + jC f R f (11)
pacitance transducer for industrial applications providing a pro- where Rf and Cf are the feedback resistance and feedback capaci-
grammable measurement frequency ranging between 100 kHz tance respectively. The amplitude of output voltage Vo is propor-
and 5 MHz [35]. Dean and Rane designed a digital frequency- tional to Cm because the value of Vi, , Cf and Rf are constant in the
locked loop system for capacitance measurement [36]. In this circuit.
work, an AC based capacitance measurement method, which is When jR f C f > > 1
commonly used in Electrical Capacitance Tomography (ECT) sys-
Cm
tem, is adopted [37,38]. The capacitance measurement circuit Vo = Vi
structure is shown in Fig. 8. Cf (12)
The exciting signal source circuit uses an FPGA to control two
Then, the signal conditioning circuit output voltage Vs, will pass
Direct Digital Synthesizer (DDS) chips, band-pass lters and the
through a phase sensitive demodulation circuit. Another DDS cir-
cuit sources a 20 V Peak-to-peak voltage and 1 MHz frequency sine
wave for demodulation. The output of the demodulation Vd can be
calculated by
where A, , B and are the amplitude and phase of the Vs and VDDS
respectively. When the Vs and VDDS has the same phase, = :
Vd = AB [1 cos (2t + + )] (14)
Fig. 7. Impedance matching circuit in signal conditioning unit.
H. Wu et al. / Flow Measurement and Instrumentation 46 (2015) 218229 223
When Vd passes through a low-pass lter, the output signal Vdc interference to the capacitance measurement.
is proportional to the measured capacitance Cm In order to test the repeatability and the stability of CCCS sys-
tem for the conductance and capacitance measurement, the static
Vdc = AB (15)
calibration of laminar ow has been done. For the conductance
In the switch circuit, an FPGA controls the switch sequence sensor, the gaswater two-phase laminar ow calibration is shown
alternatively to stimulate the conductance sensor and the capaci- in Fig. 11(a). For the capacitance sensor, the gasoil two-phase
tance sensor. The switch frequency is 500 Hz so that the acquisi- laminar ow calibration is shown in Fig. 11(b).
tion data of each period consists of sufcient length of both the From the calibration results, the CCCS system shows good
sensitivity in phase fraction response under different two uids
conductance data and the capacitance data for ow conditions
combinations in both the conductance and the capacitance data.
analysis [39]. In order to make the capacitance measurement more
The signal-noise ratio (SNR) of the system is higher than 70 dB
accurate, the T-type switch is used, as shown in Fig. 9. The FPGA
exhibiting a good repeatability and stability.
controls each switch in the sequence that when switches 1 and
2 are turned on, switches 3 and 4 are turned off; when switches
3 and 4 are turned on, switches 1 and 2 are turned off. This pro-
5. Experimental result and analysis
cedure avoids the inuence of the stray capacitance when the
switches are in between on and off status. A series of dynamic calibration experiments have been con-
The data acquisition system is designed with a PXI (Peripheral ducted to test the performance of CCCS in phase fraction mea-
Component Interconnect (PCI) extensions for Instrumentation) surement of oilwater two-phase ow. QCV method was used for
data acquisition card and a graphical interface. The sampling fre- the in situ water holdup to evaluate the CCCS system.
quency of conductance and capacitance is 200 kHz and the sam-
pling time is set 20 s for each experimental condition. The preci- 5.1. Experimental facility
sion of A/D conversion is 16-bit and the sampling rate is 200 kHz
per channel. The software preprocesses the collected signals of The experiments were conducted on the oilgaswater multi-
conductance and capacitance and shows the real-time acquired phase ow experimental facility of Tianjin University, as illustrated
waveform under each experimental condition. in Fig. 12. The total length of the horizontal pipeline, which is
The photos of CCCS sensing system and the sensors are shown manufactured by stainless steel, is approximately 16.6 m with in-
in Fig. 10. The copper guard shield should be set very close to the ternal diameter of 50 mm. It consists of three horizontal parts: two
concave capacitance electrodes. And a copper screen shield covers legs with the length of 7.2 m and 7.3 m respectively, and a hor-
guard shield and electrodes to avoid the electromagnetic izontal U-bend with the length of 2.1 m. A water tower with height
Fig. 10. Photos of CCCS system and sensors. (a) CCCS sensing system circuit and
(b) photo of CCCS.
Fig. 11. Calibration of conductance probes and concave capacitance. (a) Calibration
of conductance probes and (b) calibration of concave capacitance.
two-phase ow. The two sets of sensors measure the phase frac-
tion of two-phase ow within the same sensing volume. This
conguration could avoid the estimate error caused by the mis-
Fig. 18. Water holdup results measured by conductance and capacitance.
alignment of different sensors.
(a) Measurement results with different ow patterns and (b) measurement error.
The CCCS system was experimentally tested on a multiphase
ow loop. The two sets of sensors respond distinctively in the
water continuous ow and the oil continuous ow. The ow pat-
the water holdup for the different situations [40]. In this experi-
tern also affects the selection of the sensors: for the conductance
ment, the measured object of CCCS system is the same one at the
sensor, the sensitive range includes the ow patterns of ST and
same time, and different weights can be set for the conductance
ST&MI at low ow rate, and all the water continuous ow with
sensor and the capacitance sensor based on the insensitive range.
water holdup larger than 30%; for the capacitance sensor, the
In conductance sensitive range, such as ST&MI ow pattern, the
sensitive range includes all the ow patterns without ST and
weight of conductance is higher than capacitance, and in other
situation, the average weight can be used. The number of weights ST&MI at low ow rate. The average error of either the con-
should be chosen by experiments for the CCCS system. The CCCS ductance sensor or the capacitance sensor measuring water
system data fusion results for water holdup and the error in ex- holdup is less than 1.5% and the relative error is less than 5% in
periments is shown in Fig. 20. most conditions compared with QCV.
The relative error by using the CCCS measurement is lower A real-time measurement method of CCCS is provided by in-
than the conductance sensor and the capacitance sensor measured tegrating the outputs of the two sensors, which obtains an overall
separately compared with Fig. 18. Most measurement error is less estimate of phase fraction within the range from 0% to 100% in
than 5%, average error is 1.06% and standard deviation is 0.038, horizontal oilwater two-phase ow. The data fusion based
which verify the feasibility of CCCS measuring the in situ phase method delivered an average error of 1.06% for the CCCS system
fraction of oilwater two-phase ow in real time. measuring water holdup, with a standard deviation of 0.038 and a
relative error less than 5%.
The proposed structure and method of CCCS is veried to be an
6. Conclusions efcient solution to measure the water holdup in horizontal oil
water two-phase ow, as well as a demonstration of integrating
A conductance and capacitance combined sensor (CCCS) is different sensors for a more convenient installation and compre-
designed to measure the full range of water holdup of oilwater hensive measurement in similar applications in industries.
228 H. Wu et al. / Flow Measurement and Instrumentation 46 (2015) 218229
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