We actually did a 1-to-1 comparison with the single-hole orifice and the balanced flow meter, and one of the other things that popped out was the noise generation. If you are taking less energy out of the fluid, that is, the energy that leaves the fluid goes into the piping system, and goes into the surrounding environment. And if you are taking less of that energy out of the fluid, then you are putting less energy into your system, and as a result, you get much less vibration in the system and much lower acoustic energy. We did some tests as well, where we measured acoustic energy generated by these new plates and found there was about a 15-times reduction in the amount of noise energy generated. And that’s under identical flow conditions; everything is 1-for-1 except the plate itself, being a balanced plate versus a single-hole orifice.

NTB: This technology was originally designed for the space shuttle; is it in the shuttle now?

Kelley: It is not in the shuttle right now. The integration cost of these things — changing an existing flight system is very difficult. Putting it into a new flight system is relatively easy. So I would anticipate that it would be used in future flight programs, but I doubt that we will ever get it integrated into a shuttle engine. Any time you make modifications to an existing flight-certified platform, you invalidate 10 years worth of tests. You come, you put a new piece of hardware into the system, you change the system — well, now are all those tests you have run still valid or do they change? Often times, they change. And if that is the case, you have to re-verify things, so you go into an extensive test program in order to do it, and that is very expensive.

But in a new system, it is easy to design it in and have it in on the ground floor and have it run through preliminary testing.

NTB: How does it help reduce gas prices?

Kelley: Custody transfer. There is a very special class of flow meters that are called “custody transfer flow meters.” And in order to be a custody transfer flow meter, it has to be very accurate, it has to have very low permanent pressure losses. And the balanced flow meter fits in that realm. We’re actually in the process of doing a bunch of API and ASME testing, which are the American Petroleum Institute and American Society of Mechanical Engineers. They have some testing protocols for custody transfer differential pressure flow meters. We’re following their protocols, and we have access to a unique Marshall calibration facility that is a NIST primary standard — National Institute of Standards and Tests — that’s a primary standard that rated at about 0.27%. Custody transfer meters need to be below 0.5%, and the closer you get to 0 in total system error, the better you are. With the totally non-optimized design, we’re looking at 0.6%, and within the next two test rounds, we expect to be between 0.1 and 0.2% error, total system error, on these flow meters. So what that means is, custody transfer is kind of like the electric meter on your house. It’s got to be certified. They have to know it is really accurate so they know they are charging you at the same rate they are charging your neighbors down the street. Any losses, any errors they have, go across millions of customers and cost a lot more money. There is a lot more loss there.

Also, are you sensitive enough to detect leaks? Some backwoods person out there goes and taps your power line, and creates this independent system without a meter — are other meters sensitive enough to detect that? In a gas system, like natural gas, you have a huge gas pipeline network that runs across the US. They use big flow meters and they have to be very accurate. And in companies specifically, they will usually operate two or three meters in parallel, or in series, rather, that they can evaluate how much they are being charged, and verify that they are being charged the right amount of money from the power company. Say they use natural gas in their process to run a furnace. Well, they will double-check the power company, because if the power company is wrong, it can literally cost millions of dollars a month. That’s with even a very small error. So they typically have two or three different independent meters, and they’re all sitting there in series monitoring the same thing so they can keep an eye on each other and know whether or not they are being charged the right amount. The nice thing about the balanced flow meter is no moving parts, so it doesn’t degrade with time; if there is particulate flow in the pipe, that is, if you have a single-hole orifice and you have particles, say, sand going through air or something, it piles up in front of the meter. That’s not a problem for ours; it blows through the holes because they are spread throughout the pipe. So you don’t get degradation over time in a natural gas-type system.