Real-time detector for multiple leaks in a pipeline Conference Paper uri icon

abstract

  • This paper presents a procedure to design a virtual instrument to locate simultaneous leaks in a fluid pipeline in real time by software when only the inflow and outflow of the fluid are available. The design of the instrument is tackled into three parts. First, a nonlinear subsystem that is only decoupled of one leak and is coupled to the rest of the considered leaks is obtained for each leak using a discretized model of the fluid in the pipeline. The second part of the procedure involves the design of a set of nonlinear observers or supervisors to generate a particular error vector for each leak. Using these patterns a fuzzy reasoning is proposed which searches to match the direction of the error vector in real time with one element of the set of abnormal patterns. The performance of the approach is shown using simulated and experimental data taken from a 132 m long water pilot pipeline of with flow rate of 12 l/s at the National University in Mexico.

publication date

  • 2002-01-01