IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 59, NO.
6, JUNE 2010
A Multisensor Intelligent Device for Real-Time
Multiphase Flow Metering in Oil Fields
Mahmoud Meribout, Member, IEEE, Nabeel Z. Al-Rawahi, Member, IEEE, Ahmed M. Al-Naamany,
Ali Al-Bimani, Khamis Al-Busaidi, and Adel Meribout
Abstract—In this paper, a new multiphase flow metering device
for real-time measurement of oil, gas, and water flow rates is
presented. It is composed of several electrical and acoustic sensors
whose signals are digitalized and processed by a multilayer neural
network. This latest uses the physical models of multiphase fluids
to reduce the complexity of the parameter space while improving
its accuracy. Furthermore, to overcome the uncertainties of the
electrical sensors in the range of 40%–60% and above 90% wa-
ter-cut (i.e., ranges where most of the multiphase flow meter fail),
two rings of high- and low-frequency ultrasonic sensors are used
for low and high gas fractions, respectively. The results of exper-
iments that have been conducted in an in-house laboratory-scale
multiphase flow loop show that real-time classification for up to
90% gas fraction can be achieved with less than 10% relative error.
Index Terms—Artificial intelligence, capacitance and conduc-
tance probes, embedded systems design, gas flow rate measure-
ment, multiphase flow metering, neural network, ultrasonic waves,
water-cut measurement.
I. I NTRODUCTION
R EAL-TIME measurement of the volumetric flow rate of
process fluids (e.g., flow rate of the mixture, individ-
ual phase flow rates, and fractional phase volumes) prior to
separation is widely acknowledged to be a critical parameter
in process control within the petrochemical industries since it
allows a more effective reservoir management. For example, in
offshore production consisting of several nearby wells (Fig. 1),
flow data gathered along a pipeline section of a given well can
help in identifying how this well contributes to the aggregate
flow and, hence, may help in locating a production anomaly,
such as a water or gas breakthrough in the actual well. This
allows an easier localization of well stimulation or other well
Manuscript received March 13, 2009; revised April 30, 2009. First published
September 25, 2009; current version published May 12, 2010. The Associate
Editor coordinating the review process for this paper was Dr. Dario Petri.
M. Meribout was with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engi-
neering, Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat 123, Oman. He is now with the
Department of Electrical Engineering, Petroleum Institute, Abu Dhabi, United
Arab Emirates (e-mail: kassantina@hotmail.com).
N. Z. Al-Rawahi is with the Department of Mechanical and Industrial
Engineering, Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat 123, Oman.
A. M. Al-Naamany is with the Department of Electrical and Computer
Engineering, Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat 123, Oman.
A. Al-Bimani is with the Department of Petroleum and Chemical Engineer-
ing, Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat 123, Oman.
K. Al-Busaidi is with Petroleum Development Oman, Muscat 113, Oman.
A. Meribout was with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engi-
neering, Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat 123, Oman. He is now with the
Department of Instrumentation and Control, Sonatrach Corporation, Algiers
2533, Algeria.
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TIM.2009.2028210
0018-9456/$26.00 © 2009 IEEE
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1507
treatments, such as enhanced oil recovery, to be performed to
increase the well productivity. In another application, a down-
hole monitoring of the multiphase flow allows well engineers
to control more effectively the propagation of the oil from the
actual well by adequately controlling the array of valves in that
well (e.g., switching off the valve surrounded by high water-
cut fluid). A suitable instrument for such applications should be
capable of measuring the flow rates of each phase composing
the mixed fluid, which is usually oil, water, and gas. However,
such instrument, called a multiphase flow meter (MPFM), is
complex to design since it has to determine four unknown
parameters (i.e., oil fraction, water fraction, gas fraction, and
total flow rate), in addition to the fact that most of the available
sensing techniques cannot simultaneously deal with all the three
phases. Thus, use of several complementary sensors is required.
Dealing with three unknown parameters (i.e., oil fraction, water
fraction, and total flow rate) has been successfully achieved
with less than 5% error within the whole water-cut range
[1]. These meters, however, are applicable only after complete
liquid–gas separation using bulky and costly separation tanks.
Consequently, they are impractical for applications such as
monitoring flows of individual wells or remote onshore oil
fields. Thus, there is an increasing need for portable, cheap,
and safe MPFMs to be widely deployed in oil fields worldwide.
Following extensive research that has been done, most of
the existing multiphase flow metering instruments belong to
the following two main technologies: 1) gamma-ray devices
and 2) dielectric-based devices. However, these devices are
either not safe (because of the use of radioactive sources) or
inaccurate in the case of the 40%–60% water-cut (i.e., the
percentage of water in the mixed fluid) or above the 90% water-
cut. This paper presents a new nonradioactive ultrasonic-based
intelligent multisensor (IMS) multiphase flow metering device
for the determination of the volume flow rates of multiphase
mixture components along a portion of a pipeline with different
flow regimes and without prior separation of gas. In addition
to homogenizing the flow, some properties of fluid mechanics
are introduced into the pattern recognition algorithm and have
led to the decomposition of the complicated nonlinear multi-
dimensional spaces into simpler 2-D nonlinear spaces that are
easily manageable with a dedicated multilayer neural network
algorithm. The system, which is compact and easily portable,
has been implemented and extensively tested on a laboratory-
scale multiphase flow loop with various flow regimes, fluid
densities, and flow rates. Experimental results indicate that an
error rate of ±10% can be achieved for real-time classification
of up to 90% gas fraction.
 1508 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 59, NO. 6, JUNE 2010

Fig. 1. Example of application of the MPFM in oil fields.

II. P REVIOUS R ELATED W ORKS measurement. These MPFMs have the advantage of being safe.
However, their accuracy is weak in the water-cut range of
Multiphase flow is a complex phenomenon that is difficult
40%–60%. The reason is that within this range, the mixed fluid
to understand, predict, and model. Common single-phase char-
is neither totally conductive nor an isolator, thus leading to
acteristics, such as velocity profile, turbulence, and boundary
almost the same sensor outputs within this range. In addition,
layer, are thus inappropriate for describing the nature of such
these meters are inaccurate for the water-cut range greater than
flows. Thus, most of the existing MPFMs [2]–[8] rely on the
90%. Another solution proposed in [12] uses a water-cut meter
electrical (e.g., dielectric properties) and/or other nonelectrical
and a volumetric flow-meter for measuring the gas and liquid
properties (e.g., waves or energy propagation) of the individual
phases. This invention is complicated because it requires a
phases that compose the mixed fluid to proceed with a proper
positive displacement instrument so it can avoid the problem of
calibration using either pattern recognition or lookup table
slip between the gas and liquid phases. In addition, this system
techniques, but rarely with analytical equations.
does not appear to be effective for liquid fractions below about
MPFMs using gamma- or X-rays have been successfully
10%. Another field-programmable-gate-array-based device ad-
tested in several oil fields [11], [14]–[17]. Their principle is to
dressed in [5] has been presented to compute the total mass
emit one or several waves to determine the fractions of each
flow rate of the fluid passing through it. The device has no
individual flow composing the mixed fluid. Thus, by knowing
moving mechanical parts to wear out; therefore, its theoretical
the total flow rate of this fluid using the venturi meter, the
lifespan is almost infinite. However, the device cannot deliver
individual flow rates of oil, water, and gas can be determined.
the flow rates of each individual phase constituting the fluid and
However, these meters are radioactive and, thus, are not safe to
becomes inaccurate with the presence of the gas phase. Other
be deployed in hazardous oil fields. In addition, their accuracy
embedded and processor-based devices for the measurement
greatly decreases with the presence of gas (e.g., more than 20%
of the quantity of the fuel in the engine have been proposed
error for more than 90% gas). The reason is that the online
in [6] and [7], and their accuracy is claimed to be high and
gas–liquid separator embedded in these meters may not entirely
independent of the fluid properties (e.g., viscosity, temperature,
separate the gas phase from the liquid phase, inducing substan-
and density). However, these devices are only dedicated for one
tial errors to the water-cut meter, which is connected to the liq-
single phase and do not seem to be applicable for the gas phase.
uid outlet of the separator. To remedy the errors introduced by
Thus, it is clear that, still, a substantial amount of development
the online separator, other MPFMs do not use any separator but
efforts is required, particularly in improving the accuracy levels
instead mix the flow using mechanical mixers in such a way that
over the full range of flow multiphase flow conditions.
the slip velocity between all the three phases of the fluid become
negligible, making the individual velocities approximately
equal [9], [10]. However, this concept might be valid only if all
III. P ROBLEM D EFINITION AND E XPERIMENTAL S ETUP
components of the fluid are in the liquid phase since the liquid
flow rate is usually substantially different from the gas flow rate As previously mentioned, multiphase flow metering remains
in normal multiphase transportation because of density differ- a challenging task for several research groups and companies
ence [4]. MPFMs using this approach [11] have achieved more (e.g., in addition to oil companies, food processing, water
than 20% error in the experiments since the used equations treatment, and petrochemical companies need such device as
ignored any interaction between the gas and the liquid phases. well) since it requires to find out four unknown parameters. An
Other nonradioactive commercially available meters, which ideal meter would make independent direct measurements of
rely on the electrical properties of the mixed fluid, use the each of these parameters, which is not possible. One alternative
capacitance and conductance readings to determine oil, gas, and is to use the data fusion of several sensors to compute the
water fractions [18], [19]. In addition, they use pressure sensors, fractions α, β, and γ of gas, oil, and water, respectively. Then,
a temperature sensor, and cross correlation for liquid flow rate knowing the total volume flow rate T (in liters per minute) using

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 MERIBOUT et al.: MULTISENSOR DEVICE FOR REAL-TIME MULTIPHASE FLOW METERING IN OIL FIELDS
additional sensors, the individual flow rates FG , FO , and FW
of gas, oil, and water, respectively, can be computed using the
following equations:
FG (in liters per minute) = T × α
FO (in liters per minute) = T × β
FW (in liters per minute) = T × γ.
Another alternative, in case the total volume flow rate may not
be possible to measure (e.g., in case one of the three phases is
compressible and, thus, does not exhibit a constant volume flow
rate, which is the case of the gas phase), consists of measuring
the total mass flow rate M (since this parameter is always
constant) to provide flow rates according to the following
equations:
FG (in liters per minute)
M (in kilograms per minute) × α
=
ρG
FO (in liters per minute)
M (in kilograms per minute) × β
= FGa + FWa + FOa
ρO
FW (in liters per minute)
M (in kilograms per minute) × γ
= (2)
ρW
where ρG , ρW , and ρO are the densities of gas, water, and oil,
respectively, to be provided to the MPFM during its calibration.
Thus, as mentioned previously, and to simplify the above
equations, some meters integrate an online gas–liquid separa-
tor to separately calculate the parameters α and (β, γ). The
other approach, which consists of mixing the flow to provide
similar individual flow rates, requires only the knowledge of
the total volume flow rate T to solve the individual flow rates:
FG (in liters per minute) = FO (in liters per minute) = FW
(in liters per minute) = T /3. However, both methods are
hardly applicable in practice for the reasons already mentioned
in Section I. The IMS-MPFM proposed in this paper consists
of solving the parameters α, β, and γ using four types of
sensors (i.e., capacitance, conductance, liquid ultrasonic, and
air ultrasonic sensors), in addition to using the physical model
of the multiphase flow. The parameter M is solved using
venturi and differential pressure sensors. More details on this
meter are presented in Section V. The calibration and design
of the algorithmic part of the meter required the design and
development of a multiphase phase flow loop (Fig. 2), within
which extensive experiments have been done. In this flow loop,
water and oil are carried out from two separate tanks of 2 m3
each under various regimes and flow rates, whereas the gas
phase is provided by a gas compressor. These flows are then
mixed to cross the multiphase flow metering device under test.
Before the mixing point of the loop, three single-phase flow
meters, namely, water, oil, and gas flow meters, are inserted
after the water tank, oil tank, and air compressor, respectively.
These single-phase flow meters constitute the references for
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1509
(1)
Fig. 2. Block diagram of the three-phase flow loop.
the pattern recognition algorithm to provide the following four
reference parameters:
FGa
αa =
FGa + FWa + FOa
FOa
βa =
FWa
γa =
FGa + FWa + FOa
Ma (in kilograms per minute)
= ρW × FWa + ρ0 × FOa + ρG × FGa (3)
where FWa , FOa , and FGa are the actual values of the water, oil,
and gas volume flow rates (in liters per minute), respectively,
as indicated by the single-phase flow meters. The parameters
αa , βa , and γa are the actual fractions of the gas, water, and
oil, respectively, and Ma is the actual total mass flow rate.
The goal here is to design an appropriate pattern recognition
algorithm to generate in real time and with good accuracy
the flow rates of each phase FW , FO , and FG as close as
possible to the actual fractions (i.e., FWa , FOa , and FGa ,
respectively). Hence, during the calibration phase, the operator
proceeds by adjusting the valves of the tanks and compressor
to provide various combinations of the flow rates in (3). For
each of these combinations, a host computer periodically grabs
the values of FWa , FOa , and FGa to compute the parameters
αa , βa , and γa while simultaneously collecting data from all
the sensors of the IMS-MPFM. An offline calibration of this
meter is then performed to add new reference vectors into the
parameter spaces. These latest are then explored by an adequate
pattern recognition algorithm. Fig. 3 shows the scheduling of
data sampling and processing tasks. The pattern recognition
program is regularly triggered by a timer interrupt to perform
data acquisition of either one of the single-phase flow meters
or one of the sensors of the IMS-MPFM. This is followed by
a noise removal and pattern recognition algorithm. The whole
process corresponding to one sample takes 2 ms, which leads
to 500 samples/s, providing to our IMS-MPFM the feature to
handle total volume flow rates of up to 46 m3 /h since the
diameter of the pipes in the flow loop is 2 in.
 1510
Fig. 3. Scheduling of data sampling and processing tasks.
Fig. 4. Drawing of a generic venuri meter.
IV. P HYSICAL M ODEL OF THE MPFM
To properly value the gas and liquid production from the
wells under various flow regimes, a method that relies on
physical fluid equations to determine their individual flow rates
is required to achieve good accuracy. The purpose here is to
perform adequate feature extractions to reduce the complexity
of the various parameter spaces.
A. Total Flow Rate Determination Using the Venturi Probe
The two differential pressure sensors (p1 and p2 ) attached to
the venturi probe provide an indication of the total volume flow
rate passing through it according to
T (in liters per minute)
 
 1 πD 2
2 × (p1 − p2 )
=  4 ×
2
× (4)
4 ρ
1− D 2
D1
where D1 and D2 are the higher and smaller diameters of the
throats of the venturi, p1 and p2 are the values of pressure at
these two points, and ρ is the fluid density. Fig. 4 shows a
generic drawing of a venturi meter.
Equation (4), however, is applicable only for uncompressible
fluids such as a liquid mixture and becomes less accurate in
the presence of gas. This is because the quantity of gas passing
through the meter is not the same as the total volume measured
by the reference gas meter. Therefore, directly introducing (4)
to the pattern recognition algorithm would lead to high errors.
In our case, we considered the conservation of mass instead of
volume flow rate using the following equations:
 factor f , and the mixed density ρ (e = hf ρ/2d). This equation
M (in kilograms per minute) = K × ρ × (p1 − p2 ) (5)
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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 59, NO. 6, JUNE 2010
Fig. 5. Total flow rate, function of the density, and the venturi probe.
where K is a constant, which depends on the parameters D2
and D1 of the venturi (Fig. 4). Fig. 5 shows the plot of the M
function of the actual total mass flow rate [which is similar to
the parameter M in (2)]. It can be seen that M is monotonic and
cluttered around a straight line (Δ). Thus using the parameter
M as one feature to determine the total mass flow rate might
be appropriate. Note in Fig. 5 a few isolated samples for a
mass flow rate below 26 000 kg/h (e.g., samples A, B, and C).
This is due to the limitation of the pressure sensors [p1 and p2
in (5)] to accurately cope with relatively low pressure values.
Using an additional venturi probe for low pressure values would
overcome this problem.
B. Estimation of the Fluid Density Using a Differential
Pressure Sensor and a Venturi Sensor
In multiphase metering, the differential pressure along a
vertical pipe ΔP is a function of the density of the mixed fluid
passing through it (ρ), augmented with its velocity v, i.e.,
1
ΔP (in bars) = (ρ × g × h) + e × v 2 (6)
2
where h is the distance separating the two pressure sensors, and
e is a constant that depends on the internal diameter of the pipe
d, the length between the two pressure sensors h, the friction
can provide useful information on the quantity of gas passing
 MERIBOUT et al.: MULTISENSOR DEVICE FOR REAL-TIME MULTIPHASE FLOW METERING IN OIL FIELDS
Fig. 6. Differential pressure, as a function of the gas fraction, for different
ranges of mass flow rate.
through the meter. The parameter space in Fig. 6, built during
the meter calibration, shows that ΔP tends to decrease with
an increase in the quantity of gas. In addition, some samples
(samples A and B) have been found to provide the same differ-
ential pressure for different gas fractions because of the effect
of the second term in (6) since their corresponding flow rates,
measured by the venturi sensor, are different. It is worth noting
that the plots shown in Fig. 6 are obtained by clustering the
samples into different adjacent ranges of the mass flow rate M .
Within each of these clusters, the average value of differential
pressures that correspond to the same gas fraction is computed.
Thus, the same value of the mass flow rate (e.g., mass flow rates
of 37 000 and 40 000 kg/h) provides the same samples in both
adjacent ranges. This would lead to an easy validation of (6).
Section VI-D would explain how this figure is explored during
the first of the two phases composing the pattern recognition
algorithm to determine the fluid compositions.
C. Compensation for the Gas Compressibility During the
Meter Calibration
As mentioned in Section III, since the gas phase is com-
pressible, the volume of gas passing through one section of
the pipe might change when it passes through another one.
Consequently, the gas flow rate FGa , which is measured by
the reference single-phase flow meter, might be different from
∗
the one reaching the MPFM, i.e., FGa . The challenge consists
∗
then of finding the value of FGa since it is this parameter that
would be considered as the reference for the pattern recognition
algorithm. Knowing that the gas volume flow rate T is related
to the pressure P , according to the following equation [12]:
u gas fraction with very small or inexistent gas bubbles. Hence,
T (in liters per minute) = (7)
P
where u is a constant that depends on the temperature, one can
∗ respectively, fixed to a flanged stainless-steel pipe via threaded
deduce the value of FGa using the following equation:
∗ P1
FGA (in liters per minute) = FGA × (8)
P0
where P1 and P0 are the pressure sensors near the gas flow
meter and the MPFM, respectively.
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1511
D. Driving Design Parameters for the Flow Loop and
Pattern Recognition Algorithm
Following the above discussions, an upstream pressure sen-
sor P1 was introduced in the flow loop near the gas flow meter
to provide the actual value of the gas passing through the
∗
MPFM, i.e., FGa . Furthermore, the gas fraction is estimated
using the differential pressure and venturi sensors, as indicated
in (6) and (8). Finally, the mass flow rate M is selected as a
reference for to the pattern recognition algorithm.
V. O VERALL H ARDWARE A RCHITECTURE OF
THE IMS-MPFM
As previously mentioned in Section III, our IMS-MPFM’s
measurement principle involves two groups of sensors (Fig. 7):
one group that comprises two capacitances, a conductance,
and an ultrasonic array sensor that are used to determine the
phase fractions, and another group composed of the venturi
and differential pressure sensors (DP in Fig. 7) that are used
for mass flow determination. These sensors are fixed into the
flow loop by means of flange connections and interfaced to the
computer through both its peripheral component interconnect
and serial (i.e., RS232) buses. The capacitance and conductance
sensors are used to determine the conductivity and permittivity,
respectively, of the multiphase fluid, whereas the ultrasonic
array sensor provides an indication on the fluid composition in
the regions where neither the capacitance nor the conductance
can respond accurately (for water-cut values ranging from 40%
to 60%). This constitutes a significant advantage over other
commercially available multiphase meters that use either the
conductance or capacitance sensors to determine the phase
fractions [9], [13], [15], [18], [19].
A. Ultrasonic Sensor
High-frequency ultrasound waves can easily be attenuated,
particularly when their wavelength is smaller than the size of
bubbles of the gas in the liquid mixture [3]. However, the
measurement of the time of flight of the ultrasonic waves is
more accurate when using high-frequency ultrasound waves
[11], [23]. Thus, the use of different types of ultrasound sensors
is required to cover all flow regimes: low-frequency ultrasound
sensors (i.e., less than 30 kHz sensors) to determine the fluid
density in case of high gas fraction containing large gas bubbles
and high-frequency sensors (i.e., more than 2 MHz sensors)
to more accurately determine the fluid density in case of low
two ultrasonic sensors arrays are deployed in our IMS-MPFM.
Fig. 8 shows a perspective view of the ultrasound sensors.
It comprises two rings of high- and low-frequency sensors,
holders. In each of these two rings, the transit time of the
ultrasonic waves is used as another parameter by the pattern
recognition algorithm for the determination of the mixed fluid
density. The low-frequency sensors are fixed to the pipe by
leaving a thin gap of air between the mixed fluid and their
active surface to satisfy the adaptation of impedance since
 1512
Fig. 7. Overall architecture of the MPFM.
Fig. 8. Hardware schematic block of the ultrasound transducer.
the acoustic impedance of these sensors is much higher than
the liquid acoustic impedance (Fig. 9). These two arrays of
sensors (ten sensors of 4 MHz and eight sensors of 23 kHz
resonance frequency each) are coupled to the multiflow flanged
pipeline and placed along different cross-sectional portions of
the multiflow pipeline. Each of the high-frequency sensors is
allocated in a round-robin cycle with a periodic 100-ms time
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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 59, NO. 6, JUNE 2010
Fig. 9. Fixation of the ultrasound sensors on the pipe.
slot to transmit a short pulse ultrasonic wave of around 200 V
peak-to-peak amplitude in a time-multiplexed manner using a
bidirectional multiplexer–demultiplexer device.
The other 23-kHz sensors are time multiplexed with a burst
of ten pulses of 20 V peak-to-peak amplitude. The echoes
are then collected by the preamplifier and narrow-passband
filter to enhance the signal-to-noise ratio. The filtered signal
is then amplified further and converted into digital form and
transmitted to the reduced instruction set computer processor
of the transmitter to perform features extraction task such as
delay, amplitude, and fast Fourier transform measurement of
the echo signal. These vectors are then transferred to a host
computer (i.e., main processing unit) via its serial link for fur-
ther processing, together with other features that are collected
from other sensors of the IMS-MPFM (e.g., capacitance and
conductance sensors). Following extensive experiments, it was
observed that all the above input vectors are a function not only
of the fluid density (ρ) but also of the total mass flow rate (M )
(as addressed in Section III). The same phenomenon was also
observed for both the conductance and capacitance sensors.
 MERIBOUT et al.: MULTISENSOR DEVICE FOR REAL-TIME MULTIPHASE FLOW METERING IN OIL FIELDS
Fig. 10. Plot showing average ultrasound delay versus water-cut (in percent)
for different ranges of the mass flow rate.
VI. IMS-MPFM C ALIBRATION AND THE
P ATTERN R ECOGNITION A LGORITHM
A. IMS-MPFM Training Strategy
Prior to design the pattern recognition algorithm, pattern
extraction and meter calibration tasks were performed. Indi-
vidual flow rates corresponding to various flow regimes in the
ranges [0%–100% water fraction], [0%–100% gas fraction],
and [200–600 liters/min total flow rate] have been carried out
in the multiphase flow loop. For each of these experiments, the
∗
actual flow rate of each phase FWa , FOa , and FGa , as described
in Sections III and IV, have been measured by the reference wa-
ter, oil, and gas flow meters, respectively. These three variables
are the desired outputs for the pattern recognition algorithm,
whereas its inputs are the outputs of the IMS-MPFM sensors,
which are simultaneously grabbed with these three variables.
The training process was done separately for the total flow
rate and phases composition to develop different parameter
spaces. Various pattern recognition algorithms relying on the
physical model of the fluid have then been applied on these
parameter spaces to deduce the best one in terms of accuracy
and computation time [20], [21].
B. Preliminary Compilation of the Learning Database for
Density Measurement
In Fig. 10, four plots corresponding to four different flow
rates ranges are shown. Each of these plots corresponds to the
average delay for different water-cuts within a predefined range
of the total mass flow rate M . As expected from Section V-A,
the parameter space of this figure shows that the actual water-
cut γa is inversely proportional to the average delay of the
ultrasonic waves through the mixture. However, due to the
effect of the flow velocity (6), it was observed that in some
situations, the same water-cut values correspond to slightly dif-
ferent averaged ultrasound outputs (e.g., feature points A and B
or points C and D). This led us to use the venturi probe
as a second input to estimate the volume flow rate. Another
observation in Fig. 10 is that γa follows a nonlinear and non-
parametric function of the average ultrasonic probe’s output.
Fig. 11 shows another 2-D parameter space corresponding to
the capacitance probe. As expected, for water-cut ranges below
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1513
Fig. 11. Plot showing the average capacitance response versus water-cut
(in percent) for different ranges of the mass flow rate.
40%, the average capacitance increases with the water-cut and
reaches the saturation for water-cut greater than 60% from
which a sudden jump occurs. This is because beyond this value
of the water-cut, the process fluid becomes mainly conductive,
and therefore, the capacitance probe becomes short circuit. This
constitutes one of the main drawbacks of the capacitance probe.
However, similarly to the ultrasonic probe, the response of this
sensor is nonlinear and depends on the total mass flow rate. One
possible reason for these nonlinear responses is the fact that
the multiphase flow exhibits a nonlinear function of the sensors
[e.g., the differential pressure in (6) depends on the temperature
of the mixed fluid and is proportional to the square of the fluid
velocity]. The second reason is due to the uncertainties of the
sensors and their inability to cope with some situations. For
instance the information provided by the ultrasonic sensors is
not complete since these sensors do not cover the whole section
of the pipe. The use of the 90◦ bent pipe elbows reduced to
some extent this effect, making the flow more homogeneous, al-
though this was not enough. Nevertheless, one of the best ways
to tackle the parameter spaces corresponding to Figs. 6, 10,
and [11] is to provide a neural network for each range of the
mass flow rate.
In this paper, the use of the temperature variable as an addi-
tional vector for the proposed pattern recognition algorithm is
not considered since the multiphase flow loop was built within
an indoor air-conditioned laboratory, where the temperature
was kept constant at room conditions (i.e., around 23 ◦ C).
However, since the temperature of the process fluid might vary
function of other parameters than the room temperature (e.g.,
phase friction and internal pipe–fluid friction), the use of the
temperature sensor would provide more accurate results and is,
thus, considered as a future improvement factor for the next-
generation IMS-MPFM.
C. Pattern Recognition Algorithm
Fig. 12 shows the block diagram of the pattern recognition
algorithm that has been embedded into the IMS-MPFM. The
algorithm performs in two sequential steps: First, it determines
the fraction composition using the data fusion of the capaci-
tance, conductance, ultrasound, pressure, and venturi sensors.
Then, it computes the flow rate of the mixture using the
estimated total density in addition to the differential pressure
 1514 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 59, NO. 6, JUNE 2010
Fig. 12. Software architecture of the MPFM.
and venturi sensors. All the sensors are fed to spatial digital
filters to damp possible random noise, which are mainly due to
the vibration of the pipes of the flow loop and to the unsteady
state of the flow regime. To each sensor X, the following first-
order low-pass filter was applied:
(N/2)−1
Xaverage =
X(t + t0 )
(9)
N i=1
t0 =−N/2
where N is the window size of the spatial filter, which has been
set to eight since this value could substantially reduce the level
of noise while leading to a low computation time by substituting
the division in (9) by simple right-shift instructions.
D. Fluid Composition Determination Using a
Hierarchical Neural Network
The algorithm to determine the fluid composition is com-
posed of four modules PR1, PR2, PR3, and PR4, which are con-
nected to the conductance, capacitance, ultrasonic, and pressure
sensors, respectively (in addition to the venturi sensor) (Fig. 13)
to determine the water fraction γ, oil fraction β, and gas fraction
α. As mentioned in Section IV-A [see (6)], the venturi and
differential pressure sensors are used to estimate the amount
of gas within the mixed fluid (using PR4 module in Fig. 13).
Following the 2-D parameter spaces shown in Fig. 6, the latter
performs in two sequential steps: First, it determines the class of
the actual sample using its corresponding venturi value. Then, it
applies the neural network algorithm corresponding to that class
to determine the gas fraction. This two-step mechanism (i.e.,
classification and neural network step) is similarly performed
a) Controller design: In Fig. 13, the controller enables
only one output of the first three modules, depending on the
actual fraction ranges. For instance, from Fig. 14, which shows
the averaged error on the water-cut [i.e., the water fraction
γ ∗ 100 (in percent)] using either the ultrasonic, capacitance,
or conductance sensors following several experiments in our
laboratory-scale flow loop, it can be deduced that the lowest
amount of error is obtained when the capacitance and conduc-
tance sensors are used in the water-cut percent ranges [0–32]
and [47–81], respectively. The remaining other ranges, namely,
[33–46] and [82–100], are more suitable to be handled by the
ultrasonic sensors. This leads to consider the proposed device
as a good candidate to handle fluids with very high water-cut,
which are increasingly available in out-aged oil wells.
b) Neural network features for fluid composition: Fol-
lowing extensive experiments, where different number of hid-
den layers, number of nodes, and activation functions have
been evaluated, the logsig function, with one single hidden
layer and six neurons per hidden layer, was found to be the
most appropriate in terms of accuracy and speed (since larger
number of neurons in the hidden layer did not reduce the
error significantly). Hence, the first layer of each bank is fed
to two sensors: 1) the venturi sensor and 2) the conductance,
capacitance, ultrasonic, or differential pressure sensor. The last
layer generates the phase fractions α, β, or γ. The nodes in the
hidden layer are connected to all nodes in the adjacent layers.
Each connection carries a weight wi,j . Hence, the output of a
node j in the hidden layer can be expressed as follows:
5
uj = gj wij × xi (10)
where gj is the logsig activation function, which, for a variable
x, can be expressed as follows [23]:
1
logsig(x) = . (11)
1 + exp(−x)
E. Flow Rate Determination Using a
Hierarchical Neural Network
Similarly to the fluid composition, another different multi-
layer neural network is used to determine the total mass flow
rate of the mixed fluid (Fig. 15). At first, the algorithm uses (6)
to provide an initial estimate of the total mass flow rate Ti using
the variable θ as input, where (see Section IV)

θ = ρ × (k − venturi) (12)
where k is a constant function of the offset introduced by the
data acquisition card. The density of the fluid mixture is then
computed as follows:
ρ (in kilograms per cubic meter)
in PR3 and PR2 modules to explore the 2-D nonlinear param- 

= γ + 0.81(β) + (1.2 × 10−3 × α)
eter spaces shown in Figs. 10 and 11, respectively. A similar
approach is adopted for thePR1 module as well. × 1000 kg/m3 × 100 (13)

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 MERIBOUT et al.: MULTISENSOR DEVICE FOR REAL-TIME MULTIPHASE FLOW METERING IN OIL FIELDS
Fig. 13. Hierarchical neural network for fluid fractions determination.
Fig. 14. Average aggregated errors for conductance, capacitance, and ultra-
sonic sensors.
Fig. 15. Hierarchical neural network for flow rate determination.
where the three parameters α, β, and γ are determined during
the fluid composition determination phase.
This first estimation phase is performed by exploring the
parameter space of Fig. 5. However, as shown in this figure,
different combinations of the density and venturi probe might
lead to more than one candidate total mass flow rate. This is
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1515
overcome during the second phase of the algorithm, where the
above density value ρ is fed together with the actual differential
pressure ΔPi into another neural network module of 14 neural
network banks to generate the mass flow rate residual ΔTi to be
aggregated to Ti . Note that the neural network blocks FFN-1-
to-n in Fig. 15, which are used for flow rate determination, are
different from those in Fig. 13, which are used to determine
the fluid composition. In addition, and similarly to Fig. 13,
one single hidden layer (six nodes in the hidden layer) with
logsig activation function was provided for each individual
neural network block since it provided the best satisfactory
results in terms of accuracy and execution time. Neural network
architectures with a larger number of hidden layers did not
substantially reduce the overall error.
VII. E XPERIMENTAL R ESULTS AND V ALIDATION
To cover the maximal ranges of fluid compositions and flow
rates, extensive experiments have been performed to produce
the following two databases:
1) a flow rate database with 240 sample elements (of ρ,
venturi, and ΔP probes) to cover mass flow rates M from
0 to 47 000 kg/h;
2) a phase fractions database with 470 sample elements (of
conductance, capacitance, ultrasonic, ρ, venturi, and ΔP
probes) to cover flow composition from 0% to 100% for
αa , βa , and γa , respectively.
A. Comparison of Accuracy for Offline Experiments
Prior to starting the online experiments, an offline evaluation
of the two above databases and the associated hierarchical
neural network algorithms has been performed for various
levels of noise that can easily be aggregated to sensors outputs
since these latest are intended to operate in harsh environ-
ments. Thus, slight variations of the sensors output character-
istics might be expected. Hence, various levels of noise are
added to the simulated input signals: signal-to-noise ratio = ∞
(no noise), 40 dB, 30 dB, and 20 dB. The evaluation criteria
 1516 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 59, NO. 6, JUNE 2010

TABLE I
NEURAL NETWORK RESULTS FOR VARIOUS LEVELS OF NOISE ADDED TO THE TRAINING AND VALIDATION SETS

Fig. 16. Plots showing (a) the water-cut response of the (b) capacitance, (c) conductance, and (d) ultrasound sensors.

use both the maximum error and the standard deviation σ (i.e.,
standard deviation of the error between expected and computed
distances).
In addition to the samples of the two databases, 140 new
validation tests have been used during this evaluation phase.
Table I summarizes the results.
It can be seen that a greater precision is obtained when the
noise level added to the input is the smallest. This sensitivity
can be strongly reduced by carrying out the training phase with
noisy input data. The other observation is that overall, both the
error and standard deviation are higher for the flow rate than
for the flow composition determination. This might be due to
the inaccuracy of the venturi probe to cope accurately with the
whole range of the mass flow rate since it is used as a class
discriminator only for the flow composition (see Fig. 13) and as
a neural network input for flow rate determination. This might
be overcome by using more than one venturi probe to cover
smaller mass flow rate ranges.
Following the construction of the two above databases, ex-
tensive online experiments have been conducted on the three
phase flow loop under various flow regimes, water-cut, and
flow-rate ranges using the platform shown in Fig. 7 and using
the same above two databases.
B. Ultrasound Sensors for Accurate Flow Composition
As mentioned in Sections I and II, most existing multi-
phase flow metering devices are usually not accurate when
dealing with high water-cut values. In addition, neither the
conductance nor capacitance sensors can easily detect the
oil–water composition in the range of 40%–60%. Fig. 16
shows the merit of using our ultrasonic probe within this
range [Fig. 16(d)], where neither the capacitance [Fig. 16(b)]
nor the conductance [Fig. 16(c)] sensors could respond [11].
The error was 2.3% and −0.26% for water and oil fractions,
respectively.

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 MERIBOUT et al.: MULTISENSOR DEVICE FOR REAL-TIME MULTIPHASE FLOW METERING IN OIL FIELDS
Fig. 17. Experimental results for density measurement for (a) water-cut and
(b) gas fraction.
Fig. 18. Experimental results for gas fraction determination in the [0%–60%]
range.
C. Experimental Results for Simultaneous Flow and
Density Determination
Fig. 17(a) and (b) shows the results of several experiments for
the determination of the water and gas fractions, respectively. It
can be observed that both the water-cut and gas fraction pro-
vided by the proposed hierarchical neural network could track
in real time (i.e., up to 2 ms sampling rate) the reference in the
ranges [20%–100% water-cut] and [0%–40% gas], respectively.
In these experiments, the flow rate of each phase was randomly
increased and decreased. For both directions, the IMS-MPFM
could track even the short-period fluctuations of the reference.
These fluctuations are due to the gas phase, where the substan-
tial pipe vibrations caused by the gas compressor did not help
on providing a steady gas flow. This phenomenon disappears
when the gas is completely omitted—a situation in which the
IMS-MPFM can provide even more accurate results, regardless
of the flow regime [1]. Figs. 18 and 19 show other experimental
results for gas fractions in the [0%–60%] and [0%–100%]
ranges, respectively. Hence, the MPFM could accurately track
the variations of the gas phase, even for gas fractions greater
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1517
than 90%. Fig. 20 shows the experimental results for the total
flow rate determination in the [0–40 m3 /h] range. The MPFM
could also easily track the reference total flow rate, leading to
a small relative error of 2.5%. One of the difficulties that we
have faced while conducting the tests is the relatively short
time of the experiments due to the small storage capacity of
the water and oil tanks (i.e., 1 m3 capacity for each tank). Our
future plan is to build a larger flow loop with longer pipes
(to help create flow regimes more similar to the ones obtained
in the oil field) and larger tanks (more than 12 m3 capacity).
In addition, an emulsion layer detection device to detect the
pure oil and water interfaces would be installed in the storage
tank to continuously run the experiments while avoiding the
introduction of the emulsion layer into the flow loop. The
overall relative errors are provided in Section VII-D.
D. Accuracy of the Proposed Multiphase Flow Meter for
Online Experiments
For online experiments, the error (relative error) was mea-
sured in terms of percentage uncertainty relative to the flow
rates of each phase. i.e., oil, gas, and water flow rates. The errors
for water, gas, and oil, respectively, are measured as follows:
FWa − FW
Error(W) [in percent] = × 100% (14)
FW
FGa − FG
Error(G) [in percent] = × 100% (15)
FG
FOa − FO
Error(O) [in percent] = × 100% (16)
FO
where, as mentioned in Section III, FW , FG , and FO are the
flow rates of water, gas, and oil, which are measured by the
IMS-MPFM, respectively, and FWa , FGa , and FOa are
the actual flow rates of water, gas, and oil, which are measured
by the single-phase flow meter. Table II illustrates the overall
relative error for few experiments (i.e., 13 experiments). Hence,
the aggregate relative error for each of the three phases (which
is the average of the absolute values of the relative errors
through all the experiments) was less than 10%. Using the
same database, the same result was obtained for hundreds of
other experiments (351 experiments) that have been conducted
for different combinations (i.e., different total flow rates up to
45 m3 /h and different phases [0%–100%]). This is an improve-
ment over other traditional MPFMs where the relative error is
more than 10% in most of the cases.
VIII. C ONCLUSION
This paper has shown a new cost-effective approach for
multiphase flow measurement. It consists of a nonradioac-
tive IMS-MPFM, which is composed of several electrical and
acoustic sensors and does not include any moving part. Both its
hardware and software parts were presented. This latest consists
of two hierarchical neural network algorithms to determine the
phase fractions and total mass flow rate, respectively. Results of
extensive online experiments, which have been conducted in an
in-house multiphase flow loop, show that the meter can track
multiphase flow rates of more than 90% gas for an average
relative error of less than 10%. The other equally important
 1518 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INSTRUMENTATION AND MEASUREMENT, VOL. 59, NO. 6, JUNE 2010
Fig. 19. Experimental results for gas fraction determination in the [0%–100%] range.
Fig. 20. Experimental results for flow rate determination in the [0%–100%]
range.
TABLE II
RELATIVE ERROR OF THE PROPOSED MPFM
advantage of this meter is that by integrating an in-house made
ultrasonic sonar array, it could overcome the limitations of tra-
ditional electrical sensors to operate in the full water-cut range
(i.e., 40%–60% water-cut) and for high water-cut. These are
some reasons why the proposed flow measurement technique
may constitute a new class of flow metering technology not
only in petrochemical applications, but in other industries as
well (e.g., food and mine industries).
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Mahmoud Meribout (S’85–M’91) received the
Ph.D. degree in electronics engineering from the Uni-
versity of Technology of Compiegne, Compiegne,
France, in January 3, 1995.
From November 1995 to October 2000, he was
with the NTT Corporation, Japan, and then with the
NEC Corporation, Japan, where he has been involved
in several projects related to embedded systems de-
sign. In November 2000, he joined the Department of
Electrical and Computer Engineering, Sultan Qaboos
University, Muscat, Oman. Since August 2008, he
has been an Associate Professor with the Department of Electrical Engineering,
Petroleum Institute, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. He is the holder of
several Japanese and American patents related to embedded system design.
Dr. Meribout received the NTT Best Award in 1998 for his research and
development records.
Nabeel Z. Al-Rawahi (S’94–M’97) received the
Ph.D. degree in mechanical engineering from the
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, in 2002.
He was an Assistant Professor with the University
of Michigan, where he was involved in several in-
dustrial and academic projects involving multiphase
flow and desalination. He is currently an Assistant
Professor with the Department of Mechanical and
Industrial Engineering, Sultan Qaboos University,
Muscat, Oman. His research interests include multi-
phase flow, computational fluid dynamics, desalina-
tion processes, and renewable energy.
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1519
Ahmed M. Al-Naamany received the B.Sc. degree
(with honors) in multidisciplinary engineering from
Widener University, Chester, PA, in 1986, the M.Sc.
degree in electrical engineering and computer con-
trol from Drexel University, Philadelphia, PA, in
1990, and the Ph.D. degree from the University of
Manchester, Manchester, U.K., in 1995.
He lectured on computer architecture, computer
control, and artificial intelligence applications. Since
1996, he has been with the Department of Electrical
and Computer Engineering, Sultan Qaboos Univer-
sity, Muscat, Oman, where he is currently an Assistant Professor.
Dr. Al-Naamany is a member of the IEEE Computer Society and the IEEE
Control Systems Society. He was the recipient of a Fulbright Scholarship.
Ali Al-Bimani received the M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees
in petroleum engineering from the University of
Southern California, Los Angeles.
He is currently an Associate Professor with he
Department of Petroleum and Chemical Engineer-
ing, Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat, Oman. His
research interests include well testing, reservoir en-
gineering, rock and fluid properties, and computer
applications in petroleum engineering.
Khamis Al-Busaidi received the M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in petroleum engi-
neering from the University of Manchester, Manchester, U.K.
He is currently with Petroleum Development Oman (PDO), Muscat, Oman,
where he has been involved in several industrial projects such as smart fields
and multiphase flow meters. He has been active on introducing these technolo-
gies to PDO and is an active consultant for Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat.
Adel Meribout received the B.Eng. degree in elec-
trical and computer engineering from the University
of Constantine, Constantine, Algeria, in 1995.
From January 2007 to February 2008, he was a
Research Assistant with the Department of Electrical
and Computer Engineering, Sultan Qaboos Univer-
sity, Muscat, Oman. He is currently with the De-
partment of Instrumentation and Control, Sonatrach
Corporation, Algiers, Algeria (an Algerian oil com-
pany), as an Engineer. His research interests include
embedded Instrumentation design and implementa-
tion in the areas of oil and gas.