A highly-sensitive electrical capacitance tomography (ECT) system based on an HP4284 impedance analyser has been developed and used to quantify low concentration multiphase flows in wet gas separation processes. The system hardware provides high accuracy (0.05%) and high resolution (10−17 F). The sensor was calibrated in an environmental chamber with solid samples of known permittivity over ranges of temperature and humidity. Adaptive calibration and adjacent electrode pair correction techniques were applied to image very low concentration profiles. This paper describes the techniques used and presents the experimental results obtained from a test flow rig called Twister, which has been designed to separate liquid droplets from wet gas streams. The test results over a range of operating conditions (20% to 95% humidity) demonstrate that the ECT system is capable of reconstructing clear images of the droplet distribution inside Twister. Changes as small as 1 gWater/kgAir in the droplets form liquid were detectable. It has also shown that the concentration of the condensable phase can be estimated quantitatively within 20% in comparison with the reference measurements.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.