Interband cascade laser from Maxion detects petroleum pipeline leaks

Physical Sciences developed an instrument to detect liquid petroleum product leaks from buried pipelines using Fuelfinder, with interband cascade laser technology from Maxion.

Gail Overton

Related To:

Maxion Technologies Inc

May 12, 2012

A handheld sensor that uses interband cascade laser (ICL) technology from Maxion is being marketed by Physical Sciences Inc. (PSI) for remote detection of petroleum pipeline leaks.

Andover, MA--With support from the U.S. Department of Transportation and a consortium of industrial users, Physical Sciences Inc. (PSI) is expanding its Remote Methane Leak Detector (RMLD) platform for detecting liquid petroleum product leaks from buried pipelines using Fuelfinder. Able to detect gasoline constituent vapors 10 ppm, Fuelfinder uses interband cascade laser (ICL) technology developed by PSI's subsidiary company Maxion Technologies (College Park, MD). These ICLs operate at room temperature and interrogate hydrocarbon vapors in the mid-infrared signature spectral region near 3.4 microns. PSI plans both handheld and airborne configurations, and field demonstrations in partnership with its industrial user consortium are planned for later this summer.

Produced by Heath Consultants Inc. (Houston, TX) under license to PSI, the RMLD handheld version detects small leaks at distances up to 100 feet from the surveyor, and is used for routine walking surveys of gas distribution pipelines. The airborne RMLD surveys transmission pipelines from light single engine fixed- and rotary-winged aircraft flying up to 1200 feet above ground. Introduced in 2005, PSI says that more than 1500 low-cost, battery powered RMLD units are in use worldwide.

SOURCE: Physical Sciences Inc.; www.psicorp.com/news_events/display_news.html?id=1266

About the Author

Gail Overton

Senior Editor (2004-2020)

Gail has more than 30 years of engineering, marketing, product management, and editorial experience in the photonics and optical communications industry. Before joining the staff at Laser Focus World in 2004, she held many product management and product marketing roles in the fiber-optics industry, most notably at Hughes (El Segundo, CA), GTE Labs (Waltham, MA), Corning (Corning, NY), Photon Kinetics (Beaverton, OR), and Newport Corporation (Irvine, CA). During her marketing career, Gail published articles in WDM Solutions and Sensors magazine and traveled internationally to conduct product and sales training. Gail received her BS degree in physics, with an emphasis in optics, from San Diego State University in San Diego, CA in May 1986.