despite market declines, turbine flowmeters remain major ... · ket for measuring hydrocarbon-based...

52 October, 2002 Flow Control

Turbine flowmeters havebeen around for manyyears. In fact, the gener-ally accepted view placesthe invention of the first

turbine meter in 1790. However, itwasn’t until World War II and after-wards that turbine meters began beingused in industrial environments. Andeven though turbine meters are facingcompetition today from new technolo-gy flowmeters, the turbine market isstill very large and is growing in somesegments.

The word “turbine” is derived froma Latin word that means “spinningthing.” The ancient Greeks groundtheir flour using horizontal turbinewheels. However, the idea of using aspinning rotor or turbine to measureflow did not come about until muchlater in history. And this is what tur-bine meters have in common, the useof a rotor that spins in proportion toflow rate.

History and TypesReinhard Woltman is generally cred-

ited with the invention of the first tur-bine flowmeter in 1790. Woltman was

a German engineer who studied theloss of energy in open canals. He pub-lished several works on hydraulicengineering in the 1790s. Today’s bulkmeters, used to measure water flow inlarger quantities, are still calledWoltman flowmeters.

There are at least eight distincttypes of turbine flowmeters. Someturbine meters get their name andinspiration from types of waterwheels. Others are mainly used tomeasure the flow of water for billingpurposes. The types of turbine metersare as follows. (See Types of TurbineMeters, page 54.)

• Pelton wheel• Paddlewheel• Propeller• Woltman• Single jet• Multi-jet• Compound• AxialWhat turbine meters have in com-

mon is the use of a rotor that spins orrotates in proportion to the flow rate.Measuring flow in this way requiresthe capability of detecting the rota-tional speed of the rotor. For this rea-son, the turbine meter as it is usedtoday had to await the invention of apick-off sensor with a magnet and arotating conductor. This makes it pos-sible to count the number of rotations

of a turbine rotor. In the early 1940s,turbine meters were developed toaccurately measure fuel consumptionon military aircraft in World War II.Soon after this time, turbine metersbegan to be used to measure the flowof hydrocarbons.

The use of turbine meters to meas-ure gas flow dates back to 1953.Rockwell introduced an improvedturbine meter to the gas industry in1963. It took about 10 years for turbinemeters to become accepted by the gasindustry for measuring gas flow. In1981, the American Gas Association(AGA) published its report #7,Measurement of Fuel Gas by TurbineMeters. Since that time, turbine metershave been solidly established in thegas industry, especially for custodytransfer applications.

Where they are UsedTurbine flowmeters are mainly used

to measure the flow of fluids in thefollowing four segments.

• Municipal water• Municipal and industrial gas• Oil (hydrocarbons)• Industrial liquidsTurbine meters used in the munici-

pal water industry are widely used forbilling purposes. Some turbine metersare used for residential billing purpos-es, especially single jet and multi-jet

Despite Market Declines,Turbine FlowmetersRemain Major Segment

There are still some applications where turbine

meters remain the best flow solution. Given their

very large installed based and technological

improvements being made by the suppliers, turbine

flowmeters will be around for many years to come.

By Dr. Jesse Yoder

www.FlowControlNetwork.com October, 2002 53

meters. However, nutating disc andoscillating piston positive displace-ment meters dominate this market.Because turbine meters excel at medi-um- to high-speed flows, they areused more widely for billing purposesin commercial and industrial markets.In this use, they are sold to water andgas utility companies that install themin commercial and industrial build-ings to measure the amount of waterand gas used in those buildings.

Many manufacturing plants measureliquids and gases inside of the plant aspart of the manufacturing process.These are considered to be industrialapplications. However, the water andgas that these plants use, when it isobtained from a water or gas utilitycompany, has to be measured forbilling purposes. This is considered tobe a utility application and is very sim-ilar to the measurement of gas or waterused by a hotel or office building.

Besides being used for utility gasmeasurement, turbine meters are alsoused for industrial gas measurement.The use of turbine meters to measurenatural gas for custody transfer pur-poses is an example of industrial gasmeasurement. A number of compa-nies sell into the turbine gas flowmarket, including Invensys, Elster,Instromet and Emerson Daniel.

Another important segment of theturbine flowmeter market is the mar-ket for measuring hydrocarbon-basedliquids. Both turbine and positive dis-placement flowmeters are used tomeasure the flow in this segment.Turbine meters are used to measurethe transfer of hydrocarbons in truck-ing, aviation, petroleum transporta-tion, petroleum production and petro-leum terminals. These meters are verydifferent from the smaller jet typemeters and are highly accurate andrugged industrial meters. They areused because of their accuracy andtheir reliability.

Turbine meters are also used tomeasure the flow of industrial liquids.This measurement can occur within amanufacturing plant, or it may occuras a custody transfer operation

between plants. Chemical, food pro-cessing, refining and power plants areexamples of some of the manufactur-ing plants that use turbine flowmeters.

Turbine Flowmeters Still a Viable Choice

Turbine meters belong to the classof traditional technology flowme-

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Worldwide turbine flowmeter market from 2001 to 2006 in U.S. dollars. Chartshows a compound annual growth rate

(CAGR) of -3.2 percent.

Figure 1

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ters. The history of new technology flowmeters beginsafter 1950, while the origins of traditional technologymeters predate 1950. Many traditional technologymeters have moving parts and some are mechanicalrather than electronic. New technology flowmetersinclude Coriolis, magnetic, ultrasonic, vortex and multi-

Types of


Pelton wheel. The origins ofthe Pelton wheel flowmeter goback to a type of water wheelcalled the Pelton wheel. LesterPelton (1831–1908) built thefirst Pelton wheel water wheelin Camptonville, CA. A Peltonwheel turns as a result of waterjets that impinge on bucketsattached around the outside ofthe wheel. The wheel is con-nected to a turbine. The turning of the wheel rotates theturbine and generates power. Lester Pelton formed thePelton Water Wheel Company in 1898. Today Peltonwheel flowmeters are used to measure low viscosityflows at low flow rates.

Paddlewheel. Paddlewheelflowmeters are also based on thedesign of a water wheel.Paddlewheel meters have a shaftat right angles to the flow stream.They have a lightweight paddle-wheel that spins in proportion toflow rate and are used to measurelow-speed flows. Paddlewheelflowmeters are available in bothinsertion and inline types.

Propeller. The origins of the propeller meter go back tothe invention of the propeller turbine, which is used forhydropower. Forrest Nagler designed the first fixed-bladepropeller turbine, which was installed in 1916. The pro-peller turbine has from three to six blades and resemblesthe propeller on a boat. Because propeller turbines havefewer blades than some other turbines, they are less like-ly to be damaged by debris in the water.

Today’s propeller meters are based on a similar principle.Propeller meters face into the flow and have a single bear-ing assembly. While some people do not consider propellermeters to be a type of turbine meter, they have a rotatingelement whose rotation is proportional to flow rate. Propellermeters are relatively low cost and do not require power.

Woltman. Woltman meters have a turbine whose axis is

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variable differential pressure (DP). Traditional technolo-gy flowmeters include differential pressure, turbine,positive displacement, open channel and variable area.

There is a clearly identifiable trend today towards newtechnology flowmeters and away from traditional tech-nology meters. However, despite this trend, there are sev-

Turbine Meters


in line with the direction of flow. Thesemeters are used in the municipal andindustrial water industry to measurelarger flows.They are sometimes called“bulk” meters.Their name goes back toReinhard Woltman, who invented thefirst turbine flowmeter in 1790.

Single jet. Single jet meters are widely used in resi-dential and commercial applications to measure the flowof water for billing purposes. In single jet meters, waterpasses through an orifice, creating a stream or “jet” ofwater. This jet of water is directed onto the impellerblades, causing them to rotate.

Multi-jet. Like single jet meters, multi-jet meters areused in residential and commercial applications to meas-ure the flow of water for billing purposes. Some are alsoused in industrial applications. Multi-jet meters haveseveral orifices creating several jets that are directedonto impeller blades, causing them to rotate.

Compound. Compound meters are a type of hybrid meterthat have a turbine component. Compound meters areinstalled in apartment buildings and offices where the flowrate varies between high and low flow rates. Flow ratesmight be very high in apartment buildings in the morningand evening, for example, but be very low or nonexistent atnight. Compound meters typically have a turbine componentto handle high flow rates and a positive displacement com-ponent to handle the low flow rates. They may also have asingle jet or multi-jet turbine for the lower flow rates.

Axial. Most of the turbineflowmeters used in industri-al applications to measurethe flow of hydrocarbons,industrial liquids and gasesare called axial turbinemeters. Axial meters have arotor that rotates around theaxis of flow. Axial meters dif-fer according to the number and shape of the rotors. Axialmeters for liquids have a different design from axialmeters for gases.

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eral reasons why traditional technolo-gy meters are still extremely impor-tant in today’s flowmeter market.One reason is that some of the tradi-tional technology flowmeter marketsare so large that even if they areshowing a slight decline, these metersstill represent a very large volume of

business every year. (See Figure 1,page 53.) For example, the worldwideturbine market exceeded $400 millionin 2001.

Secondly, traditional technologymeters still have a very large installedbase. This is certainly true of turbinemeters. Turbine meters are very wellentrenched in gas flow measurement, inhydrocarbon liquid measurement andin the municipal water market. Becauseend users often replace like with like,many of them will continue to use tur-bine technology for many years to come.

Third, in some cases, traditionaltechnology flowmeters really are thebest solutions for certain types offlowmeter applications. For example,it is difficult to find any flowmeterthat handles low flow rates and highviscosity fluids as well as positive dis-placement flowmeters. And turbinemeters excel at measuring the flow ofclean medium- to high-speed liquidsand gases. They are still widely usedfor this purpose.

Turbine meters also do not havesome of the limitations that some newtechnology meters have. For example,turbine meters do not have the sameline size constraint that limits the useof Coriolis meters to four inches andless, with a few exceptions. They canalso meter hydrocarbons, unlike mag-netic flowmeters. The main competi-tor to turbine flowmeters, especiallyin the larger sizes, is ultrasonicflowmeters. This is especially true fornatural gas flow, where ultrasonicflowmeters received AGA approval in1998 for use in custody transfer of nat-ural gas. DP flowmeters are also wide-ly used in this context.

Turbine flowmeter manufacturersare also coming out with improve-ments that make these meters morereliable and more competitive withnew technology meters. For example,Hoffer Flow Controls has introducedturbine meters with hybrid ceramicball bearings, thereby increasing thereliability of their meters. Bopp &Reuther is selling a HART-compatibleturbine flowmeter. It is likely, in fact,that more suppliers will incorporate


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features from new technologyflowmeters into turbine meters in thefuture, such as advanced electronics,making them both more reliable andbetter able to fit into today’s moreadvanced instrument marketplace.

Another reason why traditionaltechnology meters are holding theirown or growing in some segments isthat industrial associations play amajor role in determining whatmeters are acceptable in some appli-cations, especially for billing purpos-es. And in some cases, traditionaltechnology meters are all that is spec-ified. Until new technology flowme-ters receive approvals from the stan-dards bodies and industry associa-tions, traditional technology meterswill continue to be used.

In the United States, for example, theAmerican Water Works Association(AWWA) is very influential in layingout criteria for water meters to conformto when they are used for billing pur-poses. The AWWA has written reportsapproving both turbine and positivedisplacement flowmeters for this pur-pose. The AWWA has formed a com-mittee to study issuing a report formagnetic flowmeters, but such a reportis still several years away. The organiza-tion is also looking at the possibility offorming a committee for Coriolismeters, but has not yet done so. In themeantime, single jet, multi-jet, Woltmanand positive displacement meters dom-inate the municipal water industry.

ConclusionThere are many types of turbine

flowmeters and they are used formany different applications. Eventhough the turbine market as a wholeis showing a slow decline, some seg-ments are experiencing growth, espe-cially in areas where new technologyflowmeters have not yet penetrated.There are still some applicationswhere turbine meters remain the bestflow solution. Given their very largeinstalled based and technologicalimprovements being made by thesuppliers, turbine flowmeters will bearound for many years to come.

About the AuthorDr. Jesse Yoder is president of Flow

Research, which he founded in 1999. Hehas been a writer and analyst in processcontrol since 1986. Yoder has written over40 market studies and is currently com-pleting a 12-volume series of studies onthe worldwide flowmeter market.

Included in this series is The WorldMarket for Turbine Flowmeters, whichwas released in September of this year.Flow Research (www.flowresearch.com)offers a quarterly update service called theWorldflow Monitoring Service. Youcan contact Dr. Yoder at 781 245-3200, [email protected].

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