Patent ID: 6076048
Filing Date: 2000-06-13
Classification: F22B

Abstract:
A method for detecting and estimating leaks in any conserved flow around an industrial boiler wherein said conserved flow and industrial boiler form a process, said method comprising the steps of:(a) measuring mass flow imbalances in the process to uncover any deviation from the mass flow imbalances being zero defined as variability;(b) partitioning the variability in the measured mass flow imbalances into:1) a process model component;2) a leak model component; and3) a noise component;to form a mathematical representation of a leak in the process;(c) utilizing a family of leak shapes for said leak model component and wherein each of said leak shapes represents a leak that is non-decreasing;(d) applying least squares filtering to said mathematical representation by estimating unknown parameters from said measured mass flow imbalances to generate an estimated leak flow model;(e) estimating statistical distributions of said unknown parameters to determine the statistical significance of said unknown parameters;(f) generating a family of statistics from said family of leak shapes and wherein each of said statistics is optimized to detect a variety of leaks; and(g) combining said statistics to form a significance-testing leak statistic.