Novel Leak Detection System for PipeType Cable Installations

George Anders Kinectrics Inc.

Reza Ghafurian Con Edison
Wojtek Tylman Technical University
of Lodz
October 30, 2006

ICC Meeting in Tampa, Fl.

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Outline of the presentation

z
z
z
z
z
z

Motivation
Test installation and requirements
Monitoring system overview
Components of the monitoring system
Some results
Summary

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Motivation
z
z

Widespread usage of pipe type cables installations in

large cities in North America
Environmental and
z Rapid growth in
technical problems when a
knowledge in the field
leak occurs
of artificial intelligence
Scarcity of fairly
z Enormous computing
inexpensive and easily
capabilities of desktop
applied methods for leak
computers
detection
z Availability of data from
real installations

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Pipe type cables and leak detection

requirements
Electric cable

Pomp
Tank

Pipe

Valve

The leak detection system should:

z Be able to discover fairly small leaks,
z Should not produce false alarms,
Use sensors that are either already installed or such that are easy
to install and monitor.

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Ideas behind proposed approach (I)

z

System operator is often able to discover leaks on the

bases of the data obtained from installed sensors and
his/her experience working with this installation
The requirement for continuous monitoring and
unreliability of humans requires that an automated
system is used.
The monitoring system should mimic human actions by
learning typical system behavior, and then sound an
alarm when the observed behavior departs from normal

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Ideas behind proposed approach II)

We have selected three parameters that could be measured and that
could be used to build algorithms describing the state of the installation
(markers). We observed that during a leak:
z
z
z

Pressure in the pipe is lower than values from other measured

quantities would indicate (marker C)
The frequency of pomp operation is greater (marker P)
Pressure does not reach the valve opening threshold (marker Z)

It was also noted that the measurement noise and occasional changes in
system operation may produce results that could be interpreted as a leak
by the monitoring system.

Values produced by the markers together with the

information about non-leak disturbances must be combined
to produce a decision whether to call an alarm or not.

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Modules of the monitoring system

Marker C
Module
Pipe temp.
Soil temp.
Oil pressure
Current

Filtration
of data

Initial data
analysis

Marker P
Module

Marker Z
Module

Time

Alternative sources of disturbances

Decision
Module

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Neural Network (I)

Neural network computes fluid pressure on the basis of
the remaining measured quantities. The network structure
and its learning strategy should assure:
z
z
z

high precision in computing the pressure in the

installation,
Ability to generalize,
High resistance to errors in the input data.
The speed of learning and the accuracy of results were
main parameters on which the selection of the structure
of the network was tested.

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Neural Network (II)

The selection of the
network was tested
for a given
installation.
z Different cable
systems may require
different network
construction.
As a part of this project additional programs were
developed to rapidly construct and test various neural
networks
z

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Heuristic algorithm
pomp operation

pressure

The algorithm is based on the observed dependence of

the pressure on temperature.
The values produced by the marker are several times
greater during a leak than during a normal operation.

Marker
P
t

10

Pomp operation

temperature

t
Pump operation

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Heuristic algorithm
valve operation

pressure

The algorithm is based on the observation that during a

leak in spite of the temperature rise the pressure often
does not reach the valve operation threshold.
The algorithm analyzes the temperature changes during a
24 h period and signals a leak when:
1) the temperature rise is higher than typical, and
2) the pressure did not reach the valve opening level

11

Marker
Z
t

Valve opening threshold

temperature

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Probabilistic network
basics
The basis of a description is a
graph, which shows the
dependencies between the
variables
temperature

leak

disturbances

does not rise

The graph is
supplemented by
probability tables,
defined for each
node

12

valve does
not open

pressure
differences

d,t

d,~t

~d,t

~d,~t

0,2

0,6

~v

0,8

0,4

node r

~d

0,9

0,2

~p

0,1

0,8

node c

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Probabilistic network applied in

the system
Rapid
temperature
change

leak

Temperature
change

Probability tables are

based on several years
of observation for the
installation

disturbances
Pump operation temperature
Pressure
difference 4h

13

Valve operation

Pressure
difference
Pressure
difference 8h

Pressure
difference 18h

Input nodes
Output nodes
Internal nodes

There are 31104 combinations of the possible input

values, the probabilistic network reduces the requirement
for the input quantities to 196 values.

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Sample results (I)

z
z
z

14

Several leak tests were conducted by the utilities

Initially, only some of the tests were successful.
Many undetected leaks showed that unforeseen
disturbances or peculiarities of the installation
caused misinterpretation of the input data.
This led to the development of a sophisticated
data filtration system and an implementation of
the probabilistic network.

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Sample results (III)

probability

1
0,8

2002 test - leak amount: 750 litres (0.07% of volume)

0,6
0,4
0,2

probability

0
1

0,8

2004 test - leak amount: 1400 litres (0.12% of volume)

0,6
0,4
0,2
0
0

15

10

20

30

40

50

60

time [days]

70

80

90

100

Novel Leak Detection System for Pipe-Type

Cable Installations

Conclusions
z

z
z

16

The leak detection system described here

discovers leaks introduced during the tests
conducted during the last 3 years by 2 utilities.
System applies neural and probabilistic
networks and uses some heuristic algorithms.
The work is being continued to allow discovery
of very small leaks and to automatically
recognize changing operating conditions (e.g.,
pump and valve settings).

Thank you for your attention