CHARACTERIZATION OF WAXY COOLED CRUDE OIL USING ELECTRICAL RESISTANCE TOMOGRAPHY (ERT)

Electrical resistance tomography (ERT) is one of the most common, widely implemented and promising method in production cross-sectional image displaying the distribution of electrical conductivity for a particular multiphase flow. The method includes measurement of electrical resistance characteristics converting it to image mixtures when the continuous phase is conductive.
ERT is well suited in monitoring gas-liquid flow, whereby the liquid is in a continuous phase whereas the gas is in a disperse phase. Other type of tomography sensors which involves measurement of electrical characteristics includes electrical capacitance tomography (ECT), electromagnetic tomography (EMT) and electrical impedance tomography (EIT). The mentioned electrical tomographies are safe without any radiation hazard and low cost comparing to nuclear based methods. ERT has the advantage among others for its excellent time resolution produced from very fast measurements of electrical resistance. Multiphase flow is of great importance in various industrial processes. As the most important characteristic of a multiphase flow, the flow regime not only characterizes the flow condition in an explicit way, but also determines the measurement model in each measuring method. The main focus for this project is to implement ERT for detection and measurement of gas void fractions in waxy cooled crude oil.
Measurement of void fraction of two-phase flows remains a challenging area. Thus, the report which consists of an introduction, problem statement, objectives, literature review and methodology is used to get a better understanding, set targets and solve the issues in hand.