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Title: SINGLE-CRYSTAL SAPPHIRE OPTICAL FIBER SENSOR INSTRUMENTATION

Abstract

Accurate measurement of temperature is essential for the safe and efficient operation and control of a wide range of industrial processes. Appropriate techniques and instrumentation are needed depending on the temperature measurement requirements in different industrial processes and working environments. Harsh environments are common in many industrial applications. These harsh environments may involve extreme physical conditions, such as high-temperature, high-pressure, corrosive agents, toxicity, strong electromagnetic interference, and high-energy radiation exposure. Due to these severe environmental conditions, conventional temperature sensors are often difficult to apply. This situation has opened a new but challenging opportunity for the sensor society to provide robust, high-performance, and cost-effective temperature sensors capable of operating in those harsh environments. The focus of this research program has been to develop a temperature measurement system for temperature measurements in the primary and secondary stages of slagging gasifiers. For this application the temperature measurement system must be able to withstand the extremely harsh environment posed by the high temperatures and corrosive agents present in these systems. Real-time, accurate and reliable monitoring of temperature for the coal gasification process is important to realize the full economic potential of these gasification systems. Long life and stability of operation in the high temperaturemore » environment is essential for the temperature measurement system to ensure the continuous running of the coal gasification system over the long term. In this high temperature and chemically corrosive environment, rather limited high temperature measurement techniques such as high temperature thermocouples and optical/acoustic pyrometers are available, each with their own limitations. In this research program, five different temperature sensing schemes based on the single crystal sapphire material were thoroughly investigated to determine an optimal approach for on-line, real-time, reliable, long-term monitoring of temperatures inside the coal gasification environment. Among these were a sapphire fiber extrinsic Fabry-Perot interferometric (EFPI) sensor; an intensity-measurement based polarimetric sapphire sensor and a broadband polarimetric differential interferometric (BPDI) sapphire sensor. Based on the current evaluation and analysis of the experimental results, the broadband polarimetric differential interferometric (BPDI) sensor system was chosen for further prototype instrumentation development because of it's superior performance compared to the other systems. This approach is based on the self-calibrating measurement of the optical path length differences in a single-crystal sapphire disk, which is a function of both the temperature dependent birefringence and the temperature dependent dimensional changes.« less

Authors:
; ;
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (US)
Sponsoring Org.:
(US)
OSTI Identifier:
819437
DOE Contract Number:  
FC26-99FT40685
Resource Type:
Technical Report
Resource Relation:
Other Information: PBD: 10 Sep 2002
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
01 COAL, LIGNITE, AND PEAT; BIREFRINGENCE; COAL GASIFICATION; FIBERS; GASIFICATION; MONITORING; MONOCRYSTALS; OPTICAL FIBERS; PYROMETERS; RADIATIONS; RESEARCH PROGRAMS; SAPPHIRE; TEMPERATURE MEASUREMENT; THERMOCOUPLES; TOXICITY

Citation Formats

Wang, A, Pickrell, G, and May, R. SINGLE-CRYSTAL SAPPHIRE OPTICAL FIBER SENSOR INSTRUMENTATION. United States: N. p., 2002. Web. doi:10.2172/819437.
Wang, A, Pickrell, G, & May, R. SINGLE-CRYSTAL SAPPHIRE OPTICAL FIBER SENSOR INSTRUMENTATION. United States. https://doi.org/10.2172/819437
Wang, A, Pickrell, G, and May, R. 2002. "SINGLE-CRYSTAL SAPPHIRE OPTICAL FIBER SENSOR INSTRUMENTATION". United States. https://doi.org/10.2172/819437. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/819437.
@article{osti_819437,
title = {SINGLE-CRYSTAL SAPPHIRE OPTICAL FIBER SENSOR INSTRUMENTATION},
author = {Wang, A and Pickrell, G and May, R},
abstractNote = {Accurate measurement of temperature is essential for the safe and efficient operation and control of a wide range of industrial processes. Appropriate techniques and instrumentation are needed depending on the temperature measurement requirements in different industrial processes and working environments. Harsh environments are common in many industrial applications. These harsh environments may involve extreme physical conditions, such as high-temperature, high-pressure, corrosive agents, toxicity, strong electromagnetic interference, and high-energy radiation exposure. Due to these severe environmental conditions, conventional temperature sensors are often difficult to apply. This situation has opened a new but challenging opportunity for the sensor society to provide robust, high-performance, and cost-effective temperature sensors capable of operating in those harsh environments. The focus of this research program has been to develop a temperature measurement system for temperature measurements in the primary and secondary stages of slagging gasifiers. For this application the temperature measurement system must be able to withstand the extremely harsh environment posed by the high temperatures and corrosive agents present in these systems. Real-time, accurate and reliable monitoring of temperature for the coal gasification process is important to realize the full economic potential of these gasification systems. Long life and stability of operation in the high temperature environment is essential for the temperature measurement system to ensure the continuous running of the coal gasification system over the long term. In this high temperature and chemically corrosive environment, rather limited high temperature measurement techniques such as high temperature thermocouples and optical/acoustic pyrometers are available, each with their own limitations. In this research program, five different temperature sensing schemes based on the single crystal sapphire material were thoroughly investigated to determine an optimal approach for on-line, real-time, reliable, long-term monitoring of temperatures inside the coal gasification environment. Among these were a sapphire fiber extrinsic Fabry-Perot interferometric (EFPI) sensor; an intensity-measurement based polarimetric sapphire sensor and a broadband polarimetric differential interferometric (BPDI) sapphire sensor. Based on the current evaluation and analysis of the experimental results, the broadband polarimetric differential interferometric (BPDI) sensor system was chosen for further prototype instrumentation development because of it's superior performance compared to the other systems. This approach is based on the self-calibrating measurement of the optical path length differences in a single-crystal sapphire disk, which is a function of both the temperature dependent birefringence and the temperature dependent dimensional changes.},
doi = {10.2172/819437},
url = {https://www.osti.gov/biblio/819437}, journal = {},
number = ,
volume = ,
place = {United States},
year = {Tue Sep 10 00:00:00 EDT 2002},
month = {Tue Sep 10 00:00:00 EDT 2002}
}