Toward Water Volume Fraction Calculation in Multiphase Flows Using Electrical Capacitance Tomography Sensors

Real-time monitoring of water volume fraction in multiphase flows is an important problem for a number of industrial applications. The water phase in the multiphase flows may correspond to either the dispersed phase or the continuous phase. In the past, several low-cost and nonintrusive techniques based on the electrical capacitance tomography (ECT) has been developed to image and monitor in real-time multiphase flows containing water. However, such monitoring becomes increasingly challenging for high salinity levels, and no reliable ECT-based method is presently available which could work for obtaining water volume fraction in multiphase flows for all water salinity levels. In this paper, we propose a new approach based on the Hanai's formula for complex dielectric constant and taking advantage of the Maxwell-Wagner-Sillars effect to obtain, to a good approximation, water volume fractions in multiphase flows containing water as either dispersed or continuous phase.