Downhole Acoustic Flow Meter

This Silixa-led collaboration with Chevron, Statoil, Saudi Aramco and UCL will develop a downhole fibre optic–based distributed sensor array for acoustic flow metering based on Silixa’s Intelligent Distributed Acoustic Sensor (iDASTM) technology.
iDAS measures the acoustic field at every metre along a fibre optic cable, and so enables distributed flow measurement without requiring any complicated additional hardware. The project has already resulted in successful trials in a number of Statoil North Sea wells and Chevron offshore wells in the Gulf of Thailand. The project is due for completion in January 2013 with the aim to provide a non-intrusive downhole distributed acoustic monitoring system that, in addition to flow profiling, can provide valuable information for downhole diagnostics.