Non-intrusive sensor system

• US 9,528,914 B2
• Filed: 09/27/2013
• Issued: 12/27/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 09/27/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Rosemount Incorporated (Emerson Electric Company)
• Original Assignee: Rosemount Incorporated (Emerson Electric Company)
• Inventors: Schumacher, Mark Stephen
• Primary Examiner(s): Bui, Bryan
• Application Number:
  US14/039,957
• Publication Number:
  US 20150094988A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,187 Days
• Field of Search: 702/188
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G01M 99/00 Subject matter not provided for in other groups of this subclass
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 17/02 electric
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/37537 Virtual sensor
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 23/0221 Preprocessing measurements, e.g. data collection rate adjustment; Standardization of measurements; Time series or signal analysis, e.g. frequency analysis or wavelets; Trustworthiness of measurements; Indexes therefor; Measurements using easily measured parameters to estimate parameters difficult to measure; Virtual sensor creation; De-noising; Sensor fusion; Unconventional preprocessing inherently present in specific fault detection methods like PCA-based methods
• CPC Class Codes: Y02P 90/02 Total factory control, e.g. smart factories, flexible manufacturing systems [FMS] or integrated manufacturing systems [IMS]

Abstract

A non-intrusive sensor system includes an array of sensors disposed in a process to measure various input process phenomena and a logic unit that analyses the sensor measurements using an empirical model to produce an estimate of a further process phenomenon not measured directly by any of the array of sensors. The sensors within the array of sensors may be non-intrusive sensors that measure input process phenomena in an intrusive or non-intrusive manner but are non-intrusive with respect to the output process phenomenon as none of these sensors comes into direct contact with the process fluid or process element exhibiting the output process phenomenon. The sensors within the array of sensors can be any type of sensors that produce a measurement of a particular process phenomenon at the same or at different locations within a process.

Claims

1. A measurement system for use in analyzing an operation of process equipment within a process, comprising:

a plurality of sensors, including at least one non-intrusive sensor disposed external to a component within the process containing a material, wherein each of the plurality of sensors measures a different physical process phenomenon within the process associated with the material in the component to produce a sensor measurement indicative of the respective physical process phenomenon; and

a logic module communicatively coupled to each of the plurality of sensors to receive the sensor measurements, the logic module including a logic engine and a model that relates measurements of the values of each of the different physical process phenomenon to a further physical process phenomenon, wherein the logic module operates on a computer processor device to determine a value of the further physical process phenomenon using the model and the sensor measurements.

2. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein each of the plurality of sensors is disposed in a different one of a set of process devices and wherein the logic module is disposed in a further process device separate from each of the set of process devices.

3. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein each of the plurality of sensors is disposed in a different one of a set of process devices and the logic module is disposed in one of the set of process devices, wherein the logic module is communicatively coupled to one of the sensors via an internal communication connection within the one of the set of process devices and is communicatively coupled to one or more of the other of the plurality of sensors via an external communication connection.

4. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein the logic module is coupled to one or more of the plurality of sensors via a process control protocol communication network.

5. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein the logic module is communicatively coupled to one or more of the plurality of sensors via a near field communications communication link.

6. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein the logic module is communicatively coupled to one or more of the plurality of sensors via a radio frequency identification communication link.

7. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein the logic module provides power to one or more of the sensors via a radio frequency communication link.

8. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein the logic module includes a further logic engine to detect a potential fault with one or more of the plurality of sensors.

9. The measurement system of claim 8, wherein the further logic engine performs fault detection based on a comparison of the sensor measurements from the plurality of sensors using the model.

10. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein the model is a principle component analysis model.

11. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein the model is a partial least squares model.

12. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein the model is an empirical model.

13. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein the further physical process phenomenon is a different type of physical process phenomenon than any of the physical process phenomenon measured by any of the plurality of sensors.

14. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein each of the plurality of sensors measures a different type of physical process phenomenon.

15. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein the further physical process phenomenon is the same type of physical process phenomenon measured by at least one of the plurality of sensors but relates to the type of physical process phenomenon at a different location than the physical process phenomenon measured by the at least one of the plurality of sensors.

16. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein the further physical process phenomenon is the same type of physical process phenomenon measured by at least one of the plurality of sensors and relates to the type of physical process phenomenon at the same location as the physical process phenomenon measured by the at least one of the plurality of sensors.

17. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein the further physical process phenomenon is a different type of physical process phenomenon than the physical process phenomena measured by any of the plurality of sensors but relates to the same physical location as the physical process phenomenon measured by at least one of the plurality of sensors.

18. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein each of the plurality of sensors measures a different type of physical process phenomenon.

19. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein two or more of the plurality of sensors measures a different type of physical process phenomenon at the same physical location.

20. The measurement system of claim 1, wherein two or more of the plurality of sensors measures the same type of physical process phenomenon at different physical locations within the process.

21. The measurement system of claim 1, further including a host device communicatively connected to the logic module to receive the determined value of the further physical process phenomenon.

22. The measurement system of claim 21, wherein the logic module is communicatively coupled to one or more of the plurality of sensors using a first communication technique and the logic module is communicatively coupled to the host device using a second communication technique different than the first communication technique.

23. A method of determining a physical process parameter, comprising:

measuring a plurality of different physical process phenomenon within a process to produce a measurement value indicative of each of the physical process phenomenon, wherein at least one measurement value is produced by a non-intrusive sensor disposed external to a component within the process containing a material associated with the measurement value;

communicating each of the measurement values to a logic module via a communication link;

processing, using a computer device, the measurement values with a model that relates each of the different physical process phenomenon to a further physical process phenomenon to determine a value of the further physical process phenomenon using the model and the sensor measurements; and

communicating the value of the further physical phenomenon as the physical process parameter to a host device.

24. The method of claim 23, wherein measuring the plurality of different physical process phenomenon within the process includes measuring each of the plurality of different physical process phenomenon using a non-intrusive sensor.

25. The method of claim 24, wherein communicating each of the measurement values to a logic module via a communication link includes communicating one or more of the measurement values via a common communication link.

26. The method of claim 24, wherein communicating each of the measurement values to a logic module via a communication link includes communicating two or more of the measurement values via different communication links.

27. The method of claim 24, wherein communicating each of the measurement values to a logic module includes communicating one of the measurement values via a near field communications communication link.

28. The method of claim 24, wherein communicating each of the measurement values to a logic module includes communicating one of the measurement values via a radio frequency identification communication link.

29. The method of claim 24, further comprising using a sensor to make one of the measurements and providing power to the sensor via a radio frequency communication link.

30. The method of claim 24, further including using a computer device to detect a potential fault with one or more of the non-intrusive sensors.

31. The method of claim 30, wherein detecting a potential fault includes comparing the plurality of measurements using the model.

32. The method of claim 24, wherein processing the measurement values with a model includes processing the measurement values with a principle component analysis model.

33. The method of claim 24, wherein processing the measurement values with a model includes processing the measurement values with a partial least squares model.

34. The method of claim 24, wherein the further physical process phenomenon is a different type of physical phenomenon than any of the measured physical phenomenon associated with the measurements.

35. The method of claim 24, wherein measuring the plurality of different physical process phenomenon within the process to produce a measurement value indicative of each of the physical process phenomenon includes measuring a different type of physical phenomenon for measurement to produce the measurement values.

36. The method of claim 24, wherein the further physical phenomenon is the same type of physical phenomenon associated with at least one of the plurality of measurements, but relates to the type of physical phenomenon at a different location than the physical process phenomenon associated with the at least one of the plurality of measurements.

37. The method of claim 24, wherein communicating each of the measurement values to a logic module via a communication link includes communicating at least one of the measurement values to the logic module via a first type of communication link and wherein communicating the value of the further physical phenomenon to a host device includes communicating the value of the further physical phenomenon via a second type of communication that is different than the first type of communication link.

38. The method of claim 37, wherein the first communication link is a wireless communication link and the second communication link is a wired communication link.

39. The method of claim 37, wherein the second communication link is a process protocol based communication link.

40. The method of claim 24, further including using the further physical parameter value at the host to detect a device problem within the process plant.

41. The method of claim 24, further including using the further physical parameter value at the host to perform on-line control of the process.

42. A process measurement system for use in a process, comprising:

a plurality of non-intrusive sensors to be disposed within the process, wherein each of the plurality of non-intrusive sensors measures a different physical process phenomenon within the process to produce a sensor measurement indicative a physical process phenomenon; and

a logic module disposed in a process device that is communicatively coupled to each of the plurality of non-intrusive sensors to receive the sensor measurements, the logic module including a logic engine and a model that relates measurements of the values of each of the different physical process phenomenon to a further physical process phenomenon, wherein the logic module operates on a computer processor device to determine a value of the further physical process phenomenon using the model and the sensor measurements;

a host device communicatively coupled to the logic module;

a first communication network disposed between one or more of the plurality of non-intrusive sensors and the logic module; and

a second communication network disposed between the logic module device and the host device.

43. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein the model is an empirical model.

44. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein the model is a principle component analysis model.

45. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein the model is a partial least squares model.

46. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein each of the plurality of non-intrusive sensors is disposed in a different one of a set of process devices and wherein the logic module is disposed in a process device separate from each of the set of process devices.

47. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein each of the plurality of non-intrusive sensors is disposed in a different one of a set of process devices and the logic module is disposed in the process device that is one of the set of process devices, wherein the logic module is communicatively coupled to one of the non-intrusive sensors via an internal communication connection within the process device and is communicatively coupled to one or more of the other of the plurality of non-intrusive sensors via a first communication network.

48. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein the first communication network comprises a near field communications communication link.

49. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein the first communication network comprises a radio frequency identification communication link.

50. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein the process device provides power to one or more of the non-intrusive sensors via a radio frequency communication link.

51. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein the logic module includes a further logic engine to detect a potential fault with one or more of the plurality of non-intrusive sensors.

52. The process measurement system of claim 51, wherein the further logic engine performs fault detection based on a comparison of the sensor measurements from the plurality of non-intrusive sensors.

53. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein each of the plurality of non-intrusive sensors measures a different type of physical process phenomenon.

54. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein each of the plurality of non-intrusive sensors measures a different type of physical process phenomenon and the further physical process phenomenon is a different type of physical process phenomenon then any of the physical process phenomenon measured by the plurality of non-invasive sensors.

55. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein two or more of the plurality of non-intrusive sensors measures a different type of physical process phenomenon at the same physical location.

56. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein the first communication network and the second communication network are different communication networks.

57. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein one of the plurality of sensors measures a process control parameter used to control the process and a secondary physical phenomenon, wherein the secondary physical phenomenon is the measured physical phenomenon sent to the logic module.

58. The process measurement system of claim 42, wherein the plurality of non-intrusive sensors and the logic module are located in close proximity within the process.