Study of Pipeline Leak Detection and Location Method Based on Acoustic Emission

Abstract

Under laboratory conditions, pipeline leak detection model has been established. We studied the effect of the internal pressure, leakage flow, the propagation distance, and different pipeline characteristics on leakage acoustic emission signal attenuation, and finally used the correlation analysis method to locate the leak point. The results show that the greater the pressure inside the pipe, the stronger the acoustic emission signal energy generated. With the increase of leakage rate, the acoustic emission signal energy gradually increased. With the increase of the distance between the sensor and the leakage point, the acoustic emission signal energy decreased, resulting in acoustic emission signal attenuation gradually. Among different pipeline characteristics, the influence of the flange to the acoustic emission signal attenuation was the largest. But the influence of the tee and weld to the acoustic emission signal attenuation was not obvious. At the same time the influence of the 90° bend was very small and pipe diameter basically did not impact on signal attenuation. The signal after wavelet decomposition used the correlation analysis method; the results were more close to the real value.