2009 International Conference on Measuring Technology and Mechatronics Automation

Study on new nethods of improving the accuracy of leak detection and location of
natural gas pipeline

Zhang Shuqing1, Gao Tianye1, Xu Hong1 Hao Guangpu1,2

2 Building-engineering departmentˈ
1 Measurement Technology Key Lab of Hebei Province
Hebei building material technology college,
Institute of Electronic Engineering, Yanshan University
Qinhuangdao, China, 066004
Qinhuangdao,China,066004
Haoguangpu@163.com
zhshq-yd@163.com
Wang Zhongdong3
3 Qinhuangdao Branch of Daqing Petroleum Institute,
Qinhuangdao, China, 066004
Wangzhongdong@163.com

Abstract—As negative pressure wave is applied to leak
detection and location of natural gas pipeline, the key is how to
realize accurate measurement of propagation velocity of
pressure wave and time difference. However, there exists
problem of lower accuracy in negative pressure wave method.
Aiming at the problems of velocity measurement formula with
low precision and low accuracy of leaking location, a modified
velocity measurement formula is proposed. In addition, based
on the theory of singularity detection of wavelet transform, the
singular characteristic of the transform wave caused by
pipeline leakage is detected accurately. The experimental
results show that it can achieve leak detection and location of
natural gas with higher accuracy through these methods.
measurement and location technology, velocity measurement
formula is modified. In addition, based on the theory of
singularity detection of wavelet transform, the singular
characteristic of the transform wave caused by pipeline
leakage could be detected accurately with less measurement
error.
II. THE PRINCIPLE OF LOCATION
Assume that the length of pipeline is L , the position of
leak point is X , the propagation times from leak point to
the upstream and downstream regions are t1 and t 2
respectively, as shown in Fig.1. It is clear from Fig.1 that:

Keywords- natural gas pipeline; leak detection and location ;

negative pressure wave; wavelet transform; singularity detection ­ L
° t1 + t2 = v
° (1)
I. INTRODUCTION ®t1 − t2 = Δt
° X = v ⋅t
In recent years, natural gas is paid more attention as a ° 1
kind of clean energy. Pipeline has the advantages such as ¯
economy, high efficiency and environmental protection in
transportation of petroleum and natural gas. However, with We can get the position of leak point:
the prolonging of pipeline and the damage by natural or
man-made causes, for example corrosion and fret, pipeline L + vΔt (2)
X=
accidents happened frequently. Apart from energy wasting 2
and economic loss, pipeline leak causes environmental
pollution, because substance in pipeline is unsafe and Where v is the propagation velocity of pressure wave in
poisonous.
pipeline, and Δt is time difference between t1 and t 2 .
Through a lot of researches on stress wave method,
time
negative wave method, mass balance method and pipeline
real-time model method, scientists suggest that negative t1
wave method is becoming more of a concern due to the Δt
advantages of simple principle and fast detection speed [1- t2
2].
But in practice, the lack of technology of velocity
accurate measurement and effective signal analysis method
X L x
has an influence on detecting and locating accuracy. The
method of improving detection accuracy is studied in this Figure 1. The principle of location
paper. First, according to the deficiency of velocity accurate

978-0-7695-3583-8/09 $25.00 © 2009 IEEE 360

DOI 10.1109/ICMTMA.2009.648
 III. MODIFICATION OF VELOCITY MEASUREMENT ª ∂V º ZRT
FORMULA −« » = 2 (7)
Propagation velocity of negative pressure wave is ¬ ∂ρ ¼T p
considered as a constant for the measurement method above,
namely, sound velocity. In practice, however, propagation Substitute Eq.7 into Eq.6ˈand β reduces to:
velocity is not only dependent of density, specific heat
capacity, and velocity of propagation medium, but also
Z
correlated with material of pipeline. Consequently, there are β= (8)
errors in the position of leak point derived by Eq.2 p
inevitably.
Considering compression coefficient, density of gas and Hence, β is dependent of both Z and p . Substitute
elasticity of pipeline material, we can obtain that [3]:
Eq.5 and Eq.8 into Eq.3, v can be expressed in the form:

β
ρ Z 2 RT
v= (3) p2m
β D v= (9)
1+ . .C Z ⋅ D ⋅C
E e 1+
p⋅ E ⋅e
Where β and ρ are compression coefficient and density
From Eq.9, we see obviously that many factors have
of gas, respectively, E and D are elastic modulus and effect on v . As a result, at each position v is different
diameter of pipeline respectively, e is the thickness of pipe during the propagation. Therefore v can be regarded as a
wall, C is correction coefficient about the constraint function of distance, namely, v( x ) . Accordingly, the
condition of pipeline.
propagation time from leak point to upstream and
According to state equation of ideal gas [4]:
downstream region is t1 and t 2 respectively, which can be
pV = ZRT (4) defined by:

The gas density can be derived as: X 1

t1 = ³ dx (10)
0 v ( x)
pm
ρ= (5)
ZRT L 1
t2 = ³ dx (11)
X v( x )
Where p , V , Z and T are pressure, volume,
compression factor and temperature of gas, respectively. R Eq.10 and Eq.11 are integrals of variable upper and
and m are constant and quality of molar gas, generally take lower limit. v( x ) is virtually complexity and difficult to be
the value of 8.3143 J ( mol ⋅ K ) and 17.1× 10−3 kg mol solved by analytical methods. Considering requirements of
for natural gas. With the help of Eq.5, we find that the gas accuracy and calculating quantity, we adopt compound
density is correlated with pressure and temperature. trapezoid formula in numerical integration to satisfy the
The compression coefficient of gas is expressed as [5]: requirements of accuracy and computational complexity.
The expression of Δt can be rearranged as:
1 ª ∂V º
β =− (6)
V «¬ ∂ρ »¼T 1 X L 1
Δt = t1 − t2 = ³ dx − ³ dx
0 v( x) X v( x)

ª ∂V º hª1 X −1
1 1 º hª 1 L −1
1 1º
Where − « » and β represent the decrease and ≈ « + 2¦ + » − « + 2 ¦ + » (12)
¬ ∂ρ ¼T 2 ¬ v0 k =1 vk vX ¼ 2 ¬ vX k = X +1 vk vL ¼
shrinkage of gas volume with the increase of pressure at a
given temperature. Furthermore, the larger compression Where X is the unknown quantity, so that Eq.12 is not a
coefficient is, the more easily gas is compressed. simple definite integral, and Δt cannot be solved either.
With the aid of Eq.4, we have:

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 However, as long as the featured inflection point of Where a and b are scale factor and elongation factor
negative pressure wave signal is determined, we also can respectively. α is Lipschitz exponent of f (t ) in δ , k is
obtain the solution to Δt , so as to improve the sensitivity
and precision of leak detection. To summarize, based on a constant [7,8], W f (a, b) is continuous wavelet transform
wavelet transform modulus maxima, the singular point of
of f (t ) , W f (a , b) is the modulus of wavelet transform.
negative pressure wave can be detected precisely, and the
accurate location of the leak point of the natural gas pipeline When a = 2 j , Eq.16 can be written in the form:
can be realized as well.
IV. THE PRINCIPLE OF SINGULAR POINT DETECTION BY log 2 W f (2 j , b) ≤ log 2 k + jα (17)
WAVELET TRANSFORM

A. Wavelet Decomposition and Reconstruction Where j is the scale of wavelet transform.

According to Mallat algorithm, decomposition and
reconstruction formulae of wavelet can be given by [6]:
­ ckj −1 = ¦ hl − 2 k ⋅ clj
° l∈Z
® j −1 (13)
°d k = ¦ g l − 2 k ⋅ cl
j
¯ l∈Z
cˆkj = ¦ h k − 2l ⋅ clj −1 + ¦ g k − 2 l ⋅ dl j −1 (14)
l∈z l∈z
Where ckj −1 and d kj −1 are approximate and detailed
components of clj , respectively, hl − 2 k and g l − 2 k are
coefficients of low-pass and high-pass filter. The
decomposition and reconstruction methods based on
wavelet transform are realized by use of Mallat pyramid
algorithm. The decomposition can be seen as a passing of
signal clj through a pair of filters H and G , and
subsampling filtered signal by the two. While the
reconstructed signal is obtained by filtering the zero
expanded signals, which is performed by inserting zeros at
each sample point of approximate and detailed components,
From Eq.17 we can conclude that the term of jα
connects scale feature with Lipschitz exponent. When
α > 0 , the maximum modulus of wavelet transform
becomes larger with the increasing of scale feature j , and
vice versa. Under the condition of α = 0 , maximum
modulus of wavelet transform won’t change with j .
The edges of both noise and useful signal have
singularity, the difference of which is that the Lipschitz
exponent of noise edge is much less than 0, but the
Lipschitz exponent of useful signal edge is more than or
equal to 0. From the analysis above, with the increasing of
scale feature, the maximum modulus of noise edge
decreases rapidly. On the other hand, the maximum
modulus of useful signal edge will increase or keep
invariant. Thus the method of applying Wavelet transform
modulus maximum to singular point detection not only
eliminates noise, but also detects the singular point of
negative pressure wave signal accurately. Owing to
advantages of the method, the time difference Δt can be
calculated precisely, and the accurate location of the leak
point of the natural gas pipeline can be realized as well.
V. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS AND ANALYSIS
TABLE I. PROPAGATION VELOCITY OF NEGATIVE PRESSURE WAVE IN
PIPELINE EVERY 1000M

with a low-pass filter H and high-pass filter G . Distance Velocity Distance Velocity
(m) (m/s) (m) (m/s)
B. The Relationship between wavelet transform and
0 1083 11000 1047
Lipschitz exponent
1000 1070 12000 1047
Mallat has improved that the value of t lies in the 2000 1063 13000 1047
range δ , if the wavelet transform of f (t ) satisfies Eq.15, 3000 1059 14000 1047
then f (t ) is considered as a singular signal in the range δ . 4000 1056 15000 1047
5000 1054 16000 1047
6000 1052 17000 1047
W f (a, b) ≤ kaα  (15) 7000 1051 18000 1047
8000 1050 19000 1047
Which in turn leads to: 9000 1014 20000 1047
10000 1048
log W f (a, b) ≤ log k + α log a (16)

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 The length of pipeline L is 2000m in our experiment. It is 5
0.12

difficult for us to determine the propagation velocity of 0.08

negative pressure wave in pipeline. For convenience, we can

0.005
0
5-0.005

measure the temperature of the location in pipeline every 0.01

1000m, by applying the Eq.9, so as to determine the 0

4 -0.01

propagation velocity indirectly, as shown in Table 1. 0.01

First of all, make symmetric extension on pressure

0
3
-0.01

signals, which are measured by pressure sensors of head and

0.01

terminal end. Then we select Haar wavelet with a scale of 5

2
-0.01

as the filter in order to realize wavelet decomposition, and

0.01

the results are shown in Fig.2 to Fig.5. From Fig.4 and

-0.01
200 400 600 800 1000 1200 1400 1600 1800 2000

Fig.5, we find clearly that the error caused by boundary

Figure 5. Wavelet decomposition of signal detected by terminal end sensor
effect is decreased. Hence singular point of pressure wave
signal can be detected precisely. The experimental results
point out that singular points detected by head and terminal VI. CONCLUSION
end sensors are situated at the 481st and 998th points, According to some insufficiency of negative pressure
respectively. Furthermore, Δt can be computed, namely, wave method used in leak detection of pipeline, this paper
Δt=(998-481) × 0.01=5.17(s) . When quick searching method presents a modified velocity measurement formula, and
of Fibonacci is applied to Eq.12, the location of leak point is based on the theory of singularity detection of wavelet
calculated at 7335m on comparison with actual leak point at transform, the singular characteristic of the transform wave
7380.8m.Consequently, the accuracy is given by: caused by pipeline leakage is detected accurately. Through
integrated processing for the change of negative pressure
wave due to leak, the new method can improve monitoring
7380.8 − 7335 ability of detection technology of negative pressure wave
× 100% = 0.62% (18)
predominantly. The experimental results show that the
7380.8
location of the leak point in pipeline is detected accurately.
0.13
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
0.12

0.11
The authors are indebted to national natural science
foundation of China (50775198), natural science foundation
0.10

0.09

0.08
of Hebei province (E2008000812), and the youth innovation
200 400 600 800 1000 1200 1400 1600 1800 2000
foundation from the Petroleum natural gas head company of
China (07E1011).
Figure 2. The signal detected by head sensor

0.12 REFERENCES
0.11
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0.10
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Figure 3. The signal detected by terminal end sensor [3] Li Wei, Chen Xiping, Mao Haijie, and Pan Wei, “Investigation of
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Figure 4. Wavelet decomposition of signal detected by head sensor

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