Michell Japan will reinforce the sales of hydrocarbon dew-point analyzer for natural gas pipelines in Japan of which business Michell Instruments Ltd. UK is expanding over the world now.

Regarding the demand of analyzers for natural gas pipelines, Yoshitaka Kawano president of the company says, “We have received substantial orders for sampling systems to analyze gases for natural gas pipelines from Russia and other countries, and our UK factory has repeatedly implemented constructions for expansion during these several years. Our System Design Department is fabricating the sampling systems as tall as human height using all over the floor, which are delivered to the Middle East, Algeria and Russia. At present, Michell UK is engaged in 60% or more of this demand.” He points out that the demand of dew-point analyzers for pipelines plays the role of an engine for the rapid growth of the Michell brand.

Should water be mixed into the gas in the natural gas pipelines running through such a vast land of tundra area as in Russia, there may be a dew condensation followed by clogging of pipes to cause explosion. Therefore, a sampling system is installed on the pipelines in regular intervals, so that a dew point can be measured online.

Employed in this system is the explosion-free hydrocarbon dew-point analyzer “Condumax Ⅱ,“ which measures online continuously the dew-point temperature of hydrocarbon in natural gas based on the proven “Dark Spot” hydrocarbon dew point measurement principle of Michell’s own.

The “Dark Spot” optical technology generates a diffused reflection by making the sensor surface textured when applied to the surface. When hydrocarbon adheres to the sensor surface and is cooled, the surface becomes smooth and causes a clear reflection owing to its properties. The system is comparatively fundamental reading optically the difference in these reflective lights.

The dew point of hydrocarbon has so far not been possible, but this principle of Michell has brought a breakthrough contributing to activation of natural gas development over the world. That is why the expansion system for production have started at a dash.

In fact, however, President Kawano says, “We did not envisioned to sell the products in Japan at first. Though we were asked by the headquarters why no selling in Japan despite they are sold in China and Dubai, we did not regard Japan as our market for the reason that there is no appropriate pipeline to convey natural gas which is transported to Japan by ship after liquefied and quality-controlled, and that only laboratories instead of production plants require a high accuracy product due to the narrow land of Japan.

However, owing to the strong yen trend, Japanese EPC (Engineering, Procurement & Construction) companies have recently recovered their receipt of orders, demands are renewed in oil refineries, town gas retailing liberalization is being controlled and quality control is going on among medium-size industries. Under these growing circumstances, he says, needs to re-analyze dew points of gasified LNG have shown up now.