Keywords: Flow Meters, Oil & Gas, Coriolis, Ultrasonic, Magnetic, Vortex, Market Research Study, Automation, Control, Process, Flowmeter
Advanced flowmeter technologies such as Coriolis, vortex, magnetic, and ultrasonic offer end users increased accuracy, visibility into production operations, and low maintenance profiles, compared to the traditional differential pressure-based technologies and even older mechanical technologies. More widespread adoption of intelligent flowmeters has helped owner-operators to improve the accuracy of their flow measurements, with repeatability and reliability previously unavailable with older mechanical meters or crude methods, such as orifice plates or PD meters. Device intelligence has helped flowmeters to evolve beyond their basic purpose to be indispensable tools for process and business improvement. With increasing acceptance, the market for these advanced technologies continues to grow. However, the pace varies by technology.
In the past few years, due to the high growth in the oil and gas industry, advanced flowmeter technologies, especially Coriolis and ultrasonic, have enjoyed huge growth. However, the global market for flowmeters will remain sluggish this year due to lower oil prices, but is forecast to get back on growth track over the next few years, according to the new ARC Advisory Group “Flowmeter Global Market Research Study”. “The decline in oil prices was a major point of concern in the latter half of 2014 and continues to be a concern in 2015; however, the decline did not have significant impact on 2014 flowmeter shipments. ARC expects to see major impact in shipments in 2015 and in the near future,” according to Analyst Inderpreet Shoker, the principal author of the study.
Tough Competition among Flowmeter Technologies
Flowmeters have evolved into highly capable and reliable process instruments, offering users better flow measurement accuracy than ever. With over half a dozen technologies available, end users have a wide variety of options to choose from.
The market is seeing tough competition among various flowmeter suppliers offering varied flowmeter technologies. Clearly, different flowmeter technologies have different advantages that make them best suited for different applications. However, for most applications, more than one type of flowmeter can be a good candidate, opening opportunities for different technologies to increase their respective market shares at the expense of others. With newer and more accurate technologies becoming popular and driving the older technologies out of competition, the flowmeter market remains in a state of transition.
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