Determination of multi-component flow process parameters based on electrical capacitance tomography data using artificial neural networks

Artificial neural networks have been used to investigate their capabilities at estimating key parameters for the characterisation of flow processes, based on electrical capacitance-sensed tomographic (ECT) data. The estimations of the parameters are done directly, without recourse to tomographic images. The parameters of interest include component height and interface orientation of two-component flows, and component fractions of two-component and three-component flows. Separate multi-layer perceptron networks were trained with patterns consisting of pairs of simulated ECT data and the corresponding component heights, interface orientations and component fractions. The networks were then tested with patterns consisting of unlearned simulated ECT data of various flows and, with real ECT data of gas-water flows. The neural systems provided estimations having mean absolute errors of less than 1% for oil and water heights and fractions; and less than 10° for interface orientations. When tested with real plant ECT data, the mean absolute errors were less than 4% for water height, less than 15° for gas-water interface orientation and less than 3% for water fraction, respectively. The results demonstrate the feasibility of the application of artificial neural networks for flow process parameter estimations based upon tomography data.