System and method for measuring properties of liquid in multiphase mixtures
AssigneeSchlumberger Technology Corporation
InventorCheng-gang Xie
Life of this patent
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Abstract
This disclosure describes measuring properties of a multiphase mixture flowing in a pipe using probes with different sensitivity depths. By generating annular flow of the multiphase mixture in the pipe, the probes may be contacted with the liquid phase of the mixture flowing on an inner-wall of the pipe and apparent permittivities of the annular flow measured by the probes. These measured permittivities may be processed to determine liquid fraction of the annular flow and water-in-liquid ratio of the liquid phase of the annular flow.
Claims21
A system for measuring properties of a multiphase mixture flowing through a conduit, comprising:
- a swirl element configured to generate an annular flow of the multiphase mixture;
- a first probe coupled to an inner-wall of the conduit at a first location, the first probe being configured to contact a liquid phase of the multiphase mixture flowing along the inner wall of the conduit;
- and
- a second probe coupled to the inner-wall of the conduit at a second location, the second probe being configured to contact the liquid phase of the multiphase mixture flowing along the inner wall of the conduit;
- wherein:
- the first and second probe are configured to have different sensitivity depths;
- and
- the second probe has a second sensitivity depth where the second sensitivity depth is configured to be greater than a depth of the liquid phase flowing on the inner-wall of the conduit.
A method for measuring properties of a multiphase mixture flowing in a pipe, comprising:
- swirling the multiphase mixture to generate an annular flow in the pipe, wherein the annular flow comprises a flow of a liquid phase of the multiphase mixture on the inner-wall of the pipe;
- using a first probe with a first sensitivity depth to measure a first apparent complex permittivity of the annular flow;
- using a second probe with a second sensitivity depth to measure a second apparent complex permittivity of the annular flow, wherein the second sensitivity depth is greater than a depth of the annular flow;
- and
- using a processor to process properties of the flowing multiphase mixture from the measured apparent complex permittivities.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.