Method and system for timely detecting gas pressure irregularities using a gas meter in a power efficient manner

A gas meter comprising:

• a flow rate sensor configured to sense a measure of flow rate of a gas passing through the gas meter;
• a pressure sensor configured to sense a measure of pressure of the gas passing through the gas meter, the pressure sensor having a lower power state and a higher power measurement state;
• a controller in communication with the flow rate sensor and the pressure sensor, wherein the controller is configured to:
• determine when the measure of flow rate of the gas passing through the gas line sensed by the flow rate sensor meets one or more predetermined flow rate criteria, indicating a potential pressure condition in the gas line;
• activate the pressure sensor to the higher power measurement state from the lower power state and obtain a pressure measurement of the measure of pressure of the gas passing through the gas meter at each of a plurality of regular pressure measurement times while the measure of flow rate of the gas passing through the gas line sensed by the flow rate sensor does not indicate the potential pressure condition in the gas line;
• wherein;
• in response to the measure of flow rate of the gas passing through the gas line sensed by the flow rate sensor meeting the one or more predetermined flow rate criteria, activate the pressure sensor to the higher power measurement state from the lower power state and obtain an extra pressure measurement without waiting for a next regular pressure measurement time and determine a value related to the pressure of the gas flow;
• and
• when the measure of flow rate of the gas passing through the gas line sensed by the flow rate sensor does not meet the one or more predetermined flow rate criteria, not activating the pressure sensor to the higher power measurement state from the lower power state and obtaining an extra pressure measurement.

A non-transient computer readable medium storing instructions that when executed by a processor causes the processor to:

• determine a value related to a flow rate of a gas flow based at least in part on a measure from a flow rate sensor sensing a measure related to the flow rate of the gas flow;
• determine when the value related to the flow rate of the gas flow satisfies one or more predetermined flow rate criteria, indicating a potential pressure condition;
• at each of a plurality of regular pressure measurement times, and while the value related to the flow rate of the gas flow does not satisfy the one or more predetermined flow rate criteria, activate a pressure sensor to a higher power measurement state from a lower power sleep state and determine a value related to a pressure of the gas flow;
• when the value related to the flow rate of the gas flow does satisfy the one or more flow rate criteria, indicating the potential pressure condition, activate the pressure sensor to the higher power measurement state from the lower power sleep state without waiting for a next regular pressure measurement time and determine a value related to the pressure of the gas flow;
• and
• when the value related to the flow rate of the gas flow does not satisfy the one or more flow rate criteria, leaving the pressure sensor in a lower power sleep state until reactivated to the higher power measurement state for the next regular pressure measurement time.