DETECTING UNDERGROUND OIL LEAKS FROM THE AIR

摘要

Eric Bergeron, FlyScan Systems Inc., Canada, explains the method of detecting underground oil pipeline leaks from the air. While airborne detection of natural gas pipeline leaks has been an established practice in Europe and North America for many years, this capability is absent for crude oil and refined product pipelines. Current infrared laser techniques suited for the detection of methane are not appropriate for crude oil, as practically no methane is present in crude, and tuning an infrared laser to detect pentane (an abundant component of crude) will yield very high false alarm rates that will make its use impractical.